The Department Of Power (Mongering)

Last year, Florida's state Senate elections were rocked by allegations that dark money interests funded candidates with the sole purpose of splitting the Democratic vote to keep Republicans in power, "ghost" candidates and it worked. Now the Orlando Sentinel has unearthed one of the major players in the scandal in Florida's biggest utility company, Florida Power & Light.

 

Top executives at utility giant Florida Power & Light worked closely with the political consultants who orchestrated a scheme to promote spoiler candidates in three key state Senate elections last year, according to documents obtained by the Orlando Sentinel.

The records show that the consultants who controlled Grow United Inc., the dark-money nonprofit at the center of the “ghost” candidate scandal, billed FPL for more than $3 million days before they began moving money through the entity.

The records also show FPL has donated more than $10 million in recent years to other dark-money nonprofits controlled by some of the same consultants — and FPL CEO and President Eric Silagy has personally coordinated with those consultants on campaign contributions made through their nonprofits.

In a statement, FPL spokesperson David P. Reuter denied the company had any role in the ghost candidate scheme.

“Neither FPL nor our employees provided funding, or asked any third party to provide funding on its behalf, to Grow United in support of Florida state-level political campaigns during the 2020 election cycle,” he said. “Any report or suggestion that we had involvement in, financially supported or directed others to support any ‘ghost’ candidates during the 2020 election cycle is patently false, and we have found absolutely no evidence of any legal wrongdoing by FPL or its employees.”

Money from Grow United was used to promote independent candidates in three Senate races — District 9 in Central Florida and South Florida’s districts 37 and 39 — in an apparent effort to siphon votes from the Democratic candidates and help Republicans retain control of the 40-member Florida Senate.

The controversy has set off a wide-ranging criminal investigation by prosecutors in Miami, who have already secured a guilty plea from the independent candidate in District 37 and filed felony charges against Frank Artiles, a former Republican lawmaker accused of bribing the candidate to run.

That investigation and the Sentinel’s reporting have revealed extensive ties between the consultants behind the scheme and powerful business interests in Florida — but the new records show how closely those consultants were working with FPL specifically.

The cache of new documents was anonymously delivered to the Sentinel last week, including checks, bank statements, emails, text messages, invoices, internal ledgers and more covering a roughly four-year period between 2016 and 2020, all of which were apparently unearthed during an internal investigation by a former FPL contractor.

That contractor, Alabama-based political and communications consulting firm Matrix, LLC, has since sued its former CEO and several ex-employees, accusing them of conspiring with a Florida-based client to work on secret projects and cheat Matrix out of fees. The company’s former CEO has countersued, accusing Matrix’s owner of extortion.

The records — along with a summary of the internal Matrix investigation, which said it had identified “potential unlawful conduct” — were sent in early November to James “Jim” Robo, the chairman of Florida Power & Light’s parent company, NextEra Energy Inc. The Sentinel was also sent a partially redacted copy of the investigative summary.

The Sentinel independently corroborated dozens of details in the records — matching things such as bank routing numbers, employer identification numbers, campaign contributions, transfers between nonprofits, names and job titles, cell phone numbers, email addresses and transaction dates. Many of the details are available in public records, though some are not and were confirmed by Sentinel reporting.

 

So yeah, greedy power company wanted the GOP to stay in power so they'd have less regulation and make millions more off of Florida's people, and in 2021 that almost seems quaint compared to what Republicans are doing nationwide.