Leading Off
FL-AG, FL-Sen
The Republican Party of Florida filed a lawsuit Friday seeking to stop Democrats from airing a commercial centered around a scandal that continues to cause problems for the GOP—and is even threatening criminal prosecution.
“Hope Florida, an idea built on a promise to help Floridians in need,” says the narrator of the ad, which is paid for by the state Democratic Party and is targeted at Florida’s incumbent attorney general. “But a leaked grand jury report found taxpayer money was quietly moved into a dark money political committee that James Uthmeier controlled, not to Florida families. They found $10 million was misappropriated.”
That’s not the only spot targeting Uthmeier over Hope Florida, a charity whose stated goal is to direct people to seek help from religious organizations rather than from the government.
A separate ad from a super PAC called New Deal for All depicts Uthmeier and Sen. Ashley Moody, his immediate predecessor as attorney general, stealing medicine, hospital equipment, and even a teddy bear from suffering children.