![]() ![]() Iannotti was a candidate for Central Florida’s former Senate District 9, a seat won by Sen. Iannotti and political consultant Eric Foglesong, who face felony charges, have pleaded not guilty and are awaiting trial. Three Central Florida residents were also charged in connection with the scheme, including former candidate Jestine Iannotti and former Seminole County GOP Chairman Ben Paris, who was found guilty last year on a misdemeanor charge. He pleaded not guilty and is awaiting trial. Frank Artiles to work on South Florida state Senate races in 2020, though it’s not clear what the scope of that work entailed.Īrtiles was arrested in 2021 and charged with paying a friend nearly $45,000 to run as an independent candidate in a South Florida state Senate race the previous year. Jones also works closely with the GOP consulting firm Data Targeting, which paid $15,000 per month to former state Sen. Jones has said his group’s transfer to Let’s Preserve the American Dream was unrelated to the Grow United transfer a day earlier. That money was used to produce the mail ads that went to homes in Central and South Florida promoting the independent candidates. 30, 2020, just one day after Let’s Preserve the American Dream sent $600,000 to Grow United, a dark money nonprofit run by consultants working closely with Florida Power & Light. The transfer from Jones’ group, Foundation for a Safe Environment, was reported on Sept. Jones played a role in Florida’s 2020 ghost candidate scandal, as a group under his control transferred $630,000 to a dark money organization, Let’s Preserve the American Dream, that funded an advertising blitz promoting the independent “ghost” candidates who ran in three highly competitive state Senate races. However, Jones is the chairperson of several committees that contributed to Yarkosky’s 2022 campaign. Jones said earlier this month he doesn’t know Engels and has never worked with him. Voters also received a text message that linked to Engels’ blog post claiming Cornell had a relationship with a married man, but those messages didn’t disclose who paid for them. Some of the mailers, text messages and a video sent by Jones’ committee repeated statements Engels made on his blog and used a photo illustration of Cornell that Engels had previously published. Taylor Yarkowski, the eventual winner of the Republican primary. In addition to evidence of payment from political operatives, Engels will have to produce any communications he had about Cornell or the articles he published about her with Jones, other unsuccessful candidates for the Lake County House seat that Cornell sought and Rep. He said Friday he is obtaining a new attorney next week and will follow their direction about following the judge’s order. He also said Cornell’s request was “fairly tailored to the questions raised” in Cornell’s suit.Įngels declined to comment earlier this month about whether anyone paid him to publish the posts about Cornell. The purpose of Cornell’s suit, Engels said, seemed to be “to intimidate me from writing about political campaigns or political situations in Central Florida and beyond.”īut Orange County Circuit Court Judge James Craner ruled on Friday that Engels had not presented evidence supporting his claim that he had a journalist’s privilege. The demand for the records amounted to a “fishing expedition,” said Engels, whose attorney resigned from the case earlier this month. Some of the claims Engels published last July and August on his blog, the Central Florida Post, were repeated in mailers sent by a committee operated by Jones, a Gainesville Republican consultant.Įngels fought the request, arguing that he is a journalist and therefore has a limited right, known as a journalist’s privilege, not to be forced to reveal information or confidential news sources in court. Liz Cornell, a Republican who lost her August primary for a Lake County state House seat, is suing blogger Jacob Engels for libel after he published articles on his website accusing her of carrying on an extramarital affair and preying on an elderly client in her financial advising business.Īs part of her suit, Cornell sought a bevy of records from Engels, including any records of payment he received since the start of 2022 from her primary opponent’s campaign and several political operatives, including Stafford Jones. A Central Florida blogger and Proud Boys associate will have to produce a bevy of records, including evidence of any payment he received during the 2022 campaign from a number of top GOP operatives, including a consultant tied to the 2020 “ghost” candidate scandal, a judge ruled Friday.
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