{"id":402436,"date":"2026-09-17T11:54:13","date_gmt":"2026-09-17T11:54:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/402436\/"},"modified":"2026-09-17T11:54:13","modified_gmt":"2026-09-17T11:54:13","slug":"personnel-note-alex-barrera-joins-ballard-partners-miami-tallahassee-offices","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/402436\/","title":{"rendered":"Personnel note: Alex Barrera joins Ballard Partners\u2019 Miami, Tallahassee offices"},"content":{"rendered":"

Alex Barrera is heading from the Speaker\u2019s office to one of the top lobbying firms in Florida.<\/p>\n

Barrera, who served as Deputy Chief of Staff to former Speaker Daniel Perez, is the latest hire at Ballard Partners<\/a>, where he will join the firm\u2019s state and local government affairs practice in both its Miami and Tallahassee offices.<\/p>\n

\u201cAlex has been at the center of Florida\u2019s legislative process, and few people understand as well as he does how priorities move through the Legislature and how state and local government works,\u201d said firm founder and President Brian Ballard.<\/p>\n

\u201cHis judgment, his relationships in Tallahassee and across South Florida, and his hands-on experience delivering results for the communities and clients he has served will be an enormous asset to the clients we represent across the state.\u201d<\/p>\n

Barrera served as Perez\u2019s lead adviser on the state budget and appropriations process. In that role, he coordinated with House budget staff and the Governor\u2019s office and oversaw appropriations involving healthcare, transportation, education and public safety.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

He previously served as Finance Director for House Majority, managing donor relations for the Speaker-designate and directing a campaign finance operation supporting 85 state House seats. Before his work in the Legislature, he served as Director of Intergovernmental Affairs and as a senior adviser to Miami\u2019s City Manager.<\/p>\n

\u201cHaving spent my career working within Florida\u2019s legislative process and alongside our local governments, I look forward to helping the firm\u2019s clients navigate government at a time when the decisions made in Tallahassee and in city and county halls across Florida matter more than ever,\u201d Barrera said.<\/p>\n

Barrera\u2019s hire adds another experienced Florida hand to a firm that has seen explosive growth for nearly a decade at both the state and federal levels.<\/p>\n

In June, the firm launched an Emerging Technology and AI Practice Group<\/a>, recruiting former California Government Operations Secretary Amy Tong to lead it. The following month, Ballard added former Deputy Director of National Intelligence Amaryllis Fox Kennedy as co-Chair<\/a> before opening a Caracas office led by Scott Wagner<\/a>, extending an international network that also includes offices in Tel Aviv, Istanbul and Riyadh.<\/p>\n

That expansion has been matched by the firm\u2019s lobbying haul. Ballard reported $33.2 million in federal lobbying revenue during Q2 \u2014 nearly $11.5 million more than its nearest competitor \u2014 completing a full year atop the K Street leaderboard.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Alex Barrera is heading from the Speaker\u2019s office to one of the top lobbying firms in Florida. Barrera,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":402437,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[16],"tags":[160109,22941,22942,4870,232,234,233],"class_list":["post-402436","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tallahassee","tag-alex-barrera","tag-ballard-partners","tag-brian-ballard","tag-personnel-note","tag-tallahassee","tag-tallahassee-headlines","tag-tallahassee-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/402436","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=402436"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/402436\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/402437"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=402436"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=402436"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=402436"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}