Florida Democratic Senator JEFF CLEMENS has resigned
after he and a lobbyist for two Florida county governments had an affair. Yes, a lobbyist and a legislator literally "in bed." How gauche and louche. This is what our legislators are doing at the Governors Club, from which reporters are excluded. Tallahassee is mired, smeared, bleared and teared in corruption and this event is but a cube from the iceberg.Of course, in North Carolina, louche lobbyists can legally provide sex for a legislator, not report it as a "gift" and not be charged with ethics violations. What legal position will the Florida Ethics Commission take on this matter? Any predictions.
Lobbyists using sex as a lure is as common as Russian spies doing the same. Yet lugubrious goobers like JEFF CLEMENS keep falling for it.
In Tennessee, the late Democratic boy Governor Robert Clement's sister, Anna Belle Clement O'Brien, reportedly had a group of women known as "Anna Belle's whores" who worked the Tennessee legislature.
In 1977, Shell Oil Company energy tax lobbyist Ms. Sharon Comey invited one of Senator Jim Sasser's young aides to her residence to "do her taxes." He turned her down.
DEVON WEST, Broward County and Martin County government lobbyist, had affair with State Senator JEFF CLEMONS, who resigned
Florida Senate’s top Democrat resigns after admitting affair with lobbyist
BY MARY ELLEN KLAS
Herald/Times Tallahassee Bureau
OCTOBER 27, 2017 5:26 PM
TALLAHASSEE
The Florida Senate’s top Democratic leader, Jeff Clemens, resigned Friday after admitting to having an affair with a lobbyist during the last legislative session, saying that repairing his personal life was impossible while serving in the high-profile role.
“Effective today, I am resigning from the Florida Senate,” Clemens said in a statement Friday. “I have made mistakes I [am] ashamed of, and for the past six months I have been focused on becoming a better person. But it is clear to me that task is impossible to finish while in elected office. The process won’t allow it, and the people of Florida deserve better. All women deserve respect, and by my actions, I feel I have failed that standard. I have to do better.”
Clemens, a Lake Worth political consultant, acknowledged an affair with former Martin County lobbyist Devon West in statement first reported by Politico Florida.
Clemens, who is 47 and married, was charged with leading the election efforts of Senate Democrats in 2018. Democrats won a significant victory in September, when Annette Taddeo defeated Republican state Rep. Jose Felix Diaz in the Miami district formerly held by Republican Frank Artiles.
Artiles resigned in late April after a racially-tinged tirade against two black legislators in a Tallahassee bar. Artiles was forced to apologize on the Senate floor but resigned when the Herald/Times reported that he used his political committee to hire as “consultants” a former Hooters “calendar girl” and a Playboy model with no political experience.
Read more: “Hooters ‘calendar girl’ and Playboy ‘Miss Social’ were Artiles’ paid consultants”
Incoming Senate President Bill Galvano, a Bradenton Republican, said of Clemens’ resignation, “I think he made the right decision. My thoughts are with his family.”
The rumor about Clemens’ affair had been circulating for months in the state capital, where married lawmakers are apart from their families for months at a time and are wined and dined in the college town full of young and ambitious legislative aides and lobbyists.
Many believe the power dynamics are rife for abuse by those in power.
“It’s complete sexual harassment,” said Rep. Carlos Trujillo, a Miami Republican recently appointed by President Donald Trump to be U.S. ambassador to the Organization of American States. “Any person who has sex with a subordinate, even if it’s consensual, it’s sexual harassment. It’s a person in authority using that authority to take advantage of people.”
Trujillo predicted that Clemens’ resignation will make many others in the state’s capital city worry.
“There’s a lot of people who are going to be concerned,” he said.
Clemens told friends he had discussed the matter with his wife and the couple had entered counseling.
“Though they have been aware for some time now, I apologize again to my wife, my family and anyone and everyone that I have treated poorly in the past for putting you through this in such a public way,” he said. “I will continue the therapy I began months ago, will seek to personally apologize to anyone I have wronged while seeking forgiveness, and will spend my time being a better husband and father.
“I will miss striving to make Florida a better place for people, especially those with less of a voice. But I am confident that others will step up to continue this fight. Again, I apologize for those of you whom I have disappointed and wish you all the best of luck.”
According to the Politico report, which relied on unnamed sources, “West came into possession of Clemens’ Apple laptop, and gained access to all his contacts and personal information and then informed his wife of the tryst.”
In an effort to retrieve the laptop, which was his personal property, Clemens reached out to Sen. Jack Latvala, a Clearwater Republican and friend of Clemens. According to Politico, West left the laptop at the concierge desk at the Tennyson condominium, where she lives. When Clemens couldn’t pick up the laptop before the concierge left for the day at 6 p.m., he asked Senate Democratic Leader Oscar Braynon of Miami Lakes, who also lives at the Tennyson during session, to pick it up for him.
“Sen. Clemens acknowledged his poor judgment and for hurting those he cares about,” Braynon said Friday. “He has apologized first and foremost to his family and did the same to his constituents and colleagues.”
Latvala said that as one of the Senate’s longest-serving members he is often sought out by his colleagues for advice in sticky situations. He said Friday he wouldn’t report on what he told Clemens or West.
“If the story is accurate, telling somebody they need to follow the law and return property is being a good citizen,” he said.
Latvala said he is confident the unnamed sources Politico relied on emerged in retaliation for Artiles’ forced resignation and the Democrat’s subsequent victory in the open seat. On Tuesday, Republicans formally elected Sen. Bill Galvano, R-Bradenton, to be the next Senate president if they retain a majority. Artiles was in the audience.
“I think it’s related to that special election and probably the root cause of that special election,” Latvala said. “There’s been rumors since all this went down on Artiles and, as long as you’ve got smut-mongers who take things not for attribution to sell subscriptions, you’re going to have stuff like this.”
Efforts to reach West were unsuccessful. She left work for Martin County after the legislative session and is now employed by Broward County in their public affairs office, working on their lobbying team. According to her profile on LinkedIn, she has a bachelor’s degree from Michigan State (2006) and a master’s from East Carolina (2012).
Clemens removed his Facebook page and Twitter account when the story broke. Christian Ulvert, a Democratic political consultant and spokesperson for Clemens, said removing the accounts was done to avoid distracting from what Clemens wanted to say.
“In this day and age, where people like to use social media to drive a message, he felt it best to drive his message through traditional means,” he said.
Democrats will vote on the someone to replace Clemens as the minority leader for the 2018-20 term when they return for committee week in November. Braynon, who holds the job until 2018, told the Herald/Times he will not seek another term. That leave the position open to the next two seniors, Sens. Audrey Gibson of Jacksonville and Bill Montford of Tallahassee, or any of the other members considered the freshmen class.
Mary Ellen Klas: 850-222-3095, meklas@miamiherald.com, @MaryEllenKlas
Read more here: http://www.miamiherald.com/news/politics-government/state-politics/article181351246.html#storylink=cpy
Incoming Florida Senate Democratic leader apologizes for affair with lobbyist
By ALEXANDRA GLORIOSO 10/27/2017 06:35 AM EDT
(Politico)
TALLAHASSEE — The incoming leader of Florida's Senate Democrats apologized Thursday for having an affair with a lobbyist during the last legislative session.
"I used poor judgment and hurt people that I care about, and for that I apologized long ago. But I also owe my constituents and colleagues an apology, and I intend to do just that,” Sen. Jeff Clemens, an Atlantis Democrat who's set to lead the minority party in 2019, told POLITICO Florida in a written statement.
"No excuses are good enough or can undo the pain I've caused. I have spent a lot of time, long before I was contacted by a reporter, focusing on improving my behavior,” Clemens said. “I will always aim to be a better person, be as honest in my private life as I am with my public one, and continue to seek forgiveness from the people I have wronged.”
The affair between Clemens and lobbyist Devon West came to a head at the end of the regular spring lawmaking session, when West came into possession of Clemens’ Apple laptop and gained access to all his contacts and personal information, then informed his wife of the tryst, according to sources familiar with the affair who had spoken to Clemens.
Clemens went to Republican Senate Budget chief Jack Latvala, a mutual friend of Clemens and West, for help. And Latvala, in turn, enlisted the current Senate Democratic leader, Oscar Braynon of Miami Gardens.
Braynon and West lived in the same building, the Tennyson condominium in downtown Tallahassee. West left Clemens’ laptop in a bag at the condo's concierge desk for Braynon to pick up for Clemens.
Word of the affair began to leak out this month as lawmakers began holding committee hearings in Tallahassee amid a national discussion about sex and power dynamics in the workplace.
West did not return phone, text and Twitter messages seeking comment. Braynon refused comment, as did Latvala — a Republican candidate for governor — but neither disputed the account of the affair as related to POLITICO Florida. Latvala grew so angry with a POLITICO Florida reporter that he hung up the phone during an interview. A spokesman for Clemens said he would not comment further but did not dispute the account of the affair, either.
According to her Facebook page, West left the country for Iceland and shortly after left her job lobbying on behalf of Martin County.
Within weeks of returning, she landed a similar lobbying gig for Broward County, the state’s most Democratic county and the second-most populous in Florida.
“My decision to hire her had nothing to do with Sen. Clemens and whether or not she was in, what you say, is an affair,” said Eddie Labrador, Broward County’s top in-house lobbyist. “I was not aware of that, and it would not have made a difference to me in terms of her qualifications. Sen. Clemens is not a Broward senator. He’s a good senator and has our issues at heart. ... My decision was strictly made on the fact that she was a good fit for our office based on her knowledge and her experience, and that’s it.”
Marc Caputo and Matt Dixon contributed to this report.
UNDER THE DOME
NC Ethics Commission says sex between lobbyists, officials isn't reportable
By Craig Jarvis - cjarvis@newsobserver.com
Charlotte, N.C. News & Observer
FEBRUARY 13, 2015 4:51 PM
Sex between lobbyists and government officials who are covered under North Carolina’s ethics laws does not constitute a gift that must be listed in disclosure reports, the State Ethics Commission said Friday.
“Consensual sexual relationships do not have monetary value and therefore are not reportable as gifts or ‘reportable expenditures made for lobbying’ for purposes of the lobbying law’s expenditure reporting provisions,” the formal advisory opinion says.
The opinion was in a response to an inquiry from the Secretary of State’s lobbying compliance director, Joal H. Broun, in a letter on Dec. 15.
“You have asked whether consensual ‘sexual favors or sexual acts’ between a lobbyist and a designated individual constitutes a gift or ‘thing of value’ that would trigger the gift ban and reporting requirements,’” the opinion says.
Broun’s request also wanted to know if that activity falls within the definition of “goodwill lobbying,” which is an indirect attempt to influence legislation or executive action, such as the building of relationships, according to state law, and is also considered lobbying.
The seven-member ethics commission says Broun’s letter was “general and largely hypothetical, with little or no supporting facts,” which also limits the commission’s response. But the opinion says sexual behavior would not constitute goodwill lobbying, either.
However, providing a prostitute to a legislator or other covered official would constitute a gift or item of value and would have to be reported on disclosure forms – which, of course, would also be evidence of a crime, the opinion says.
In a footnote, commissioners add: “This interpretation does not address the legal, moral or other ramifications of two adults not married to one another engaging in consensual sexual relations with one another.”
The advisory opinion notes that the Secretary of State waived confidentiality and requested that the opinion be published.
Liz Proctor, a spokeswoman for the office, said a private attorney posed the questions to the lobbying compliance division last year. The Secretary of State’s Office decided to seek clarification from the ethics commission, she said.
Most of what the ethics commission does is confidential, and only disclosed at the request of the party who originates the request for an opinion.
In 2012, the commission investigated two lobbyists who had intimate relationships with top aides to House Speaker Thom Tillis, according to documents The News & Observer obtained at the time. Tillis’ chief of staff resigned and his policy adviser was asked to resign.
A key focus of that investigation, which did not result in any public penalties, was whether the lobbyists provided things of value to the public officials.
Read more here: http://www.newsobserver.com/news/politics-government/politics-columns-blogs/under-the-dome/article10866068.html#storylink=cpy
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