MIAMI — Stilt walkers danced to traditional Bahamian festival music. People lined up for plates of home cooked food. Vendors sold snow cones. And candidates exchanged hugs and handshakes with voters amid a sea of political signs.

This was the energetic scene outside the North Dade Regional Library in Miami Gardens where Faith in Florida hosted its annual Souls to the Polls rally, the long-standing voter engagement tradition borne out of South Florida’s Black and Caribbean churches. Organizers say the celebratory atmosphere helps their larger goal of mobilizing voters.

“We’re having a big block party right over there,” said Marlowe Jones, community organizer for Faith in Florida, a nonpartisan network of community organizers with members from more than 900 congregations throughout Florida. “We want to inspire people in Broward and people in Miami to come out and vote because right now it’s so crucial in the state of Florida.”

Faith in Florida’s Souls to the Polls events happen during campaign season, but the group organizes a host of other events throughout the year including rallies, candidate forums and school programs aimed at encouraging people to exercise their right to vote. Faith in Florida has been hosting the Souls to the Polls events since 2012, according to Rev. Rhonda Thomas, executive director of Faith in Florida who spearheaded the effort when she was working as an organizer for the group.

“Over the past 10 to 15 years, we’ve allowed ourselves to celebrate voting. Whether it’s faith-based or non-faith-based, but it’s all about community,” Thomas said. “It’s part of our culture, bringing people together.”

Organizers from Faith in Florida, which occupied a purple booth away from the people pushing individual candidates, stressed that the group does not endorse candidates or tell people who to vote for. They do, however, encourage people to get to know the candidates and their platforms.

“We’re trying to let people know how important it is to not only vote at the top, but also in your local community, because it starts right here at home,” Jones said. “It starts right here with your school board, your county commissioners, your city council.”

Throughout the morning, a steady influx of voters walking into the library dodged eager campaign staffers handing out political flyers in the parking lot, hoping to win last minute votes for their candidates.

At least two candidates — state Rep. Angie Nixon and state Sen. Shevrin Jones — stopped by the early voting site to talk with other campaign staffers and organizers. Jones, who said he grew up down the street from the library, noted the faith community’s long-standing commitment to voter engagement — specifically in the Black community.

“You have the church, which has the largest population of Black people. They come together and say, ‘Let’s all go vote as a block,’ and that’s how it all started,” Jones said.

Nixon, who also stopped by the Faith in Florida tent, said events like Souls to the Polls are important because the Black church has played a pivotal role in fighting back against voter suppression.

“The church was a catalyst when it came to fighting for civil rights and fighting for social justice and equity and equality,” Nixon said. “And right now, in this moment, as we are actively being oppressed, it’s going to be the black church that helps lead the movement to help lead us out of what’s been happening.”

Miami Gardens resident Kristal Harrington showed up early to vote with her family. She and her relatives said they did their research beforehand and chose candidates who will help move their community forward to a better place.

“I think our voice matters, and if we don’t go vote, we can’t complain later when things don’t go our way,” said Harrington.

The tradition of Souls to the Polls in Miami-Dade County has its roots in a pivotal moment for Miami’s black community, said Thomas who is also a pastor at New Generation Baptist Church in Opa-Locka.

In 1979, Arthur McDuffie, an unarmed Black man, was beaten to death by white Miami-Dade police officers who later tried to cover up the murder to make it look like a motorcycle accident. After the officers were acquitted, riots broke out in Miami, which lasted three days, brought mass destruction and gained international attention.

What happened in the aftermath of the riots, according to Thomas who grew up going to a church in Opa-Locka, was an organized push from the Black community to vote in local elections.

“When the dust had settled, it was faith leaders who were asking to help rebuild Miami,” said Thomas.

It was pastors like the late Reverend Arthur Jackson Jr. and the late Reverend Samuel Atchison, who brought their congregations to the polls on election day in the early ‘80s, long before early voting was available.

“We would encourage our congregation to go out and vote … and it was faith leaders who said we would take our souls to the polls, so that’s the shoulders I stand on,” Thomas said. “And over the years, it is hyped in a way that we can celebrate voting, especially for Black people.”

———

©2026 Miami Herald. Visit miamiherald.com. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.