Rick Fox takes FNM Senate seat in Bahamas after Garden Hills election defeat

Ex-NBA forward Rick Fox has been tapped by the opposition Free National Movement to sit in the Bahamian Senate in the wake of the country’s latest general election.

Reuters reports that opposition blocs in The Bahamas receive four of the 16 Senate seats. Fox, 56, is one of the appointees the FNM has put forward for the upper house.

The onetime Los Angeles Lakers standout had stood for the Garden Hills seat in the May 12 poll but lost to Progressive Liberal Party hopeful Mario Bowleg.

Fox had already been in public life as ambassador-at-large for sports, a post the government gave him in August 2022. His move into party politics drew wide notice in late 2025, when he started speaking out against parts of the Davis administration and wider national issues.

Foreign Affairs Minister Fred Mitchell said at the time that envoys who would not back the government’s programme ought to quit. Fox replied that he had “zero intention” of leaving the ambassadorial post.

In November 2025 he declared he would run in the 2026 general election, pitching transparency, affordability and what he called a “modern economy.” After months of talk that he might go it alone, the FNM later ratified him as its standard-bearer for Garden Hills.

On the trail, Prime Minister Philip Davis said Fox had earlier sought a PLP nomination before siding with the FNM. Fox also made headlines through his financial disclosure, which put total assets at about US$470 million and yearly income at US$4.8 million—making him the richest declared contender in the race.

The filing showed US$432 million in securities and investments, US$14.5 million in accounts receivable, US$11 million in real estate and roughly US$192,000 in bank holdings. Those numbers far exceeded earlier public guesses of his wealth, often put above US$20 million.

Whether Fox could legally hold office also stirred debate. In October 2025 he said he would renounce his Canadian citizenship if he entered “frontline politics.” Bahamian rules can bar people who voluntarily keep another country’s citizenship from serving in the House of Assembly.

Voters went to the polls on May 12, 2026, to fill all 41 seats in the House of Assembly. The PLP won a second straight term, and Davis became the first Bahamian prime minister since 1997 to secure re-election. FNM leader Michael Pintard conceded within hours of the close of voting.