From Orlando Sentinel:
Maxwell: Scandal-plagued Uthmeier has never been elected. He never should be.
One of the most important races in Florida this year is also one that’s being largely overlooked — for attorney general.
The office is critically important. It’s the only statewide election where voters get to choose a prosecutor, the person most responsible for protecting consumers and standing up to corruption.
Unfortunately, for the last two years, rather than just combating corruption and avoiding controversy, Florida’s attorney general, James Uthmeier, has been up to his neck in both.
For starters, Uthmeier — a former chief of staff for Gov. Ron DeSantis who the governor appointed to the post — was a star player in the Hope Florida scandal.
A grand jury concluded that members of the DeSantis administration orchestrated a complex financial scheme that took public money — meant to help poor people access healthcare — and diverted it to political committees and campaign advertising.
The grand jury stopped short of demanding accountability for reasons the state attorney in Tallahassee has yet to explain. But the jury’s leaked report mentioned Uthmeier 18 times and concluded he helped orchestrate the scheme and was “in a position of authority” over others involved.
Yet when journalists began reporting on the grand jury report, Uthmeier talked about arresting them … for asking questions.
If you think that’s normal, you’ve been in Florida too long. Threatening journalists with arrest for asking questions is the kind of behavior you’d expect from third-world dictators, not an alleged public servant in America.
Yet that’s just the tip of the seedy iceberg.
The Republican Uthmeier has also been held in contempt of court by one judge for defying immigration orders and ordered by another judge to turn over cellphone records he was trying to hide about his role in the taxpayer-funded stunt to fly migrant workers from Texas to Martha’s vineyard.
He used his office to threaten Catholic bishops for promoting vaccine requirements in their private schools. To try to end surrogacy rights for families struggling to have children. And to attack private companies like Target for espousing messages of inclusion he dislikes.
He’s also the self-described “man behind Alligator Alcatraz,” a boondoggle of such financially epic proportions that the Trump administration shut it down after less than a year. (After a bunch of no-bid deals were exposed.)
I can’t recall covering any public official in Florida who demonstrated such blatant disregard for the law, the constitution and for your tax dollars in such a short time.
Fortunately, voters have the opportunity to get someone much better in this important office. His name is José Javier Rodríguez. And this isn’t a case where you simply have to vote for the lesser of two evils. Rodriguez is rock-solid.
The Democratic challenger is an attorney, former assistant U.S. Secretary of Labor and former Florida state senator. He’s the son of a Cuban refugee who graduated from Harvard law school and served in the Peace Corps.
Most importantly, while he was in public office, Rodriguez stood up to special interests — so much so that, after he did, those interests targeted him in Florida’s infamous “ghost candidate” scandal.
Uthmeier, on the other hand, has repeatedly done favors for campaign donors — everyone from developers to car dealers in a move meant bolster profits for dealers while hiking costs for consumers.
So Rodriguez wants to target corporations for fleecing consumers. Uthmeier wants to target them for promoting inclusion.
In recent weeks, with the election nigh, Uthmeier has toned down his culture-war attacks and talked more about taking on street criminals and Big Tech. But Rodriguez says his top three goals will be constant from day one: “Combat crime. Cut costs. End corruption.” Wouldn’t that be nice?
Honestly, I haven’t even scratched the surface of Uthmeier’s many controversies.
He also threatened to remove duly elected local officials from office for allegedly not following the law — yet announced he was refusing to enforce Florida statutes that deal with diversity.
He has also championed the blatantly unconstitutional and laughably un-American “Stop Woke” act that attempted to tell private companies what kind of values they can espouse. Even a Trump-appointed judge called that provision “a breathtaking assertion of power.”
There’s nothing patriotic about government trying to use its power to silence varied viewpoints. Nor is it constitutional, according to multiple conservative judges who actually believe in this nation’s founding principles.
There’s much more. But if you want one final example of how different these two candidates are, there’s another Uthmeier mess worth remembering — when he was caught pocketing $100,000 a year in a secretive, sweetheart deal for a part-time teaching gig at the University of Florida.
Most adjunct professors get paid a fraction of that. Some teach for free as a way to give back to students and the legal community. In fact, the Miami Herald determined Uthmeier was “the highest-paid adjunct professor at UF’s Levin College of Law in at least a quarter century.”
Yet when the deal was exposed, Uthmeier — who was already making $140,000 a year as A.G. — claimed he had to find a way “to keep the lights on and keep food on the table.” Poor, broke James.
Compare that to Rodriguez, who said he also “developed and taught an advanced course at UF Law as a volunteer adjunct … ” Yes, as a volunteer. I’m not sure you can find a clearer example of how very differently these two men view public service.
For the record, Uthmeier says he has done nothing wrong in any of the stories mentioned above. He describes himself as a fearless patriot and stresses quite correctly that the grand jury in the Hope Florida case didn’t bring forth any charges — though Orange-Osceola State Attorney Monique Worrell recently announced she’s probing the scandal anew.
The electoral deck is certainly stacked in Uthmeier’s favor. Republicans have a massive edge in voter-registration. And he has a campaign war chest stocked with money from vested interests like those car dealers and attorneys whose firms make as much as $895 an hour working for the state and the office he controls.
In fact, if online bookies (who’ve also donated to Uthmeier’s campaign) were handicapping this race, he’d probably be a huge favorite, seeing as how Democrats haven’t unseated a GOP incumbent from statewide office in more than three decades.
But if conservatives and independents who claim to believe in the constitution and fiscal responsibility actually vote that way, that will finally change.
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