Another Florida Republican is reportedly destined for a college presidency. 

Florida International University is expected to name Lieutenant Governor Jeanette Nuñez as interim president at a meeting Friday, The Miami Herald reported. Nuñez, who earned undergraduate and master’s degrees at FIU, is expected to resign from her position Friday to take the job.

Nuñez, who has served as lieutenant governor since 2018, was previously an adjunct professor at FIU but does not appear to have prior administrative experience in higher education. As a member of Florida’s House of Representatives, Nuñez pushed for legislation to allow undocumented students to pay in-state tuition but has backed off on her support for that idea in recent years.

If hired, it seems Nuñez will step into the job right away.

One anonymous source told the newspaper that the board is seeking to act quickly on the appointment so Nuñez is in place before the Florida legislative session begins on March 4. The thinking behind the move, that source said, was that she can extract more state dollars for FIU.

FIU is currently led by Kenneth Jessell, who was named interim in January 2022 after then-president Mark Rosenberg resigned amid allegations of sexual harassment. The interim tag was later lifted, and Jessell is on a three-year contract that is set to expire in November.

If hired, Nuñez will be one of several Republican former lawmakers tapped to lead a Florida university in recent years. Others include Ben Sasse, a U.S. senator from Nebraska—who briefly served as president of the University of Florida but resigned abruptly last fall and has been dogged by questions about his spending—and former state lawmakers Richard Corcoran at New College of Florida, Fred Hawkins at South Florida State College and Mel Ponder at Northwest Florida State College. Ray Rodrigues, another former lawmaker, was hired as chancellor of the State University System of Florida in 2022 following a search that yielded eight applicants.

Another Republican former lawmaker, Adam Hasner, was recently named as a finalist for the Florida Atlantic University presidency. That search was scuttled by state officials who raised concerns about “anomalies” after FAU did not hire Republican lawmaker Randy Fine last year.

Florida International University did not respond to a request for comment from Inside Higher Ed.