LAKE CITY, Fla. — Action News Jax was the only local station to question Governor Ron DeSantis and U.S. Sen. Ashley Moody today about a grand jury report accusing his administration of misappropriating $10 million of taxpayer money from a Medicaid settlement.
The sealed grand jury report obtained by our sister station CBS Miami, states that:
“The funds were misappropriated as part of a sophisticated scheme to fund political activities.”
The grand jury report says the Centene Corporation reimbursed the state of Florida over $67 million in a Medicaid settlement.
However, the state Attorney General’s office signed off on the settlement agreement that allowed $10 million dollars of that money to be distributed to Hope Florida, a nonprofit created by First Lady Casey DeSantis.
From there, the grand jury report determined that $10 million was distributed to two political action committees and ultimately used to lobby against a marijuana legalization ballot question, aka Amendment 3, and the Republican Party of Florida.
When Foglio asked the governor about the grand jury report, he quickly dismissed the report and defended his wife.
“The settlement that ACHA did was legally sound. It was appropriate. It advanced the interest of the state. What you just said is a lie,” DeSantis told Action News Jax’s Foglio.
“There was no diversion of any Medicaid funds. That was a private settlement, where a company made a private contribution to a DSO affiliated with one of the state agencies,” DeSantis said.
“Don’t lie. Don’t get it wrong and make sure. But we dealt with this and, obviously, there was a crime committed to leak it. But the whole reason people tried to make hay of this was they were trying to use it to smear the first lady of Florida.”
We tried to follow up with the governor but he stopped taking questions before we could ask about his involvement in diverting that money.
The grand jury report specifically states that:
“After consulting AG Moody, she authorized Mr. Guard (her then-Chief Deputy Attorney General) to sign the settlement agreement in its final form.”
Foglio asked Sen. Moody to explain what her role was in the diversion of these Medicaid funds.
“In order to clarify that I was incredibly disturbed - I guess is the best way to put it - by some misinformation mischaracterization of not just the attorney general’s but of other agencies that or signatories that had to release claims as part of executing the settlement agreement,” said Sen. Moody.
Sen. Moody also told Action News Jax when she was Attorney General, her office didn’t have any knowledge of how the funds would ultimately be spent.
She also posted a statement on X here:
The grand jury report also found that
“James Uthmeier, as the Governor’s Chief of Staff at the time of settlement, was in a position of authority over those involved in settling with Centene. Testimony identified him as having involvement in directing the money after it went to Hope Florida.”
Uthmeier, who is now the state’s current Attorney General, was asked about this today during a press conference. He responded saying:
“Yeah, look, as we’ve said from the beginning, this has been a politically motivated witch hunt driven by the Democrats and a far left Democrat state attorney in Tallahassee.
“This hoax has been debunked time and time and time again.
“I’m not allowed under Florida law to comment on the report, so I can’t say if it’s true or not. But, if it is indeed true, it shows a couple things. First, it shows that there was no probable cause found that anybody did anything wrong.
Also, if this report is true, and it shows that the Democrats had to collude with the press to break the law and release a document that’s not allowed to be released under the law just to show that a far-left Democrat state attorney is incompetent, then I don’t think we have anything to worry about here.”
>>> STREAM ACTION NEWS JAX LIVE <<<
Both Sen. Moody and current-AG Uthmeier are running for reelection. What does this grand jury report mean for both candidates as they seek re-election?
Dr. Sean Freeder, Associate Professor of Political Science at the University of North Florida, offered analysis regarding the report.
“Republicans are going to assume that the Republican candidate has not done anything wrong. Democrats are generally going to assume that there’s something there. So, this is really going to turn into what do independents make of this?” Freeder said.
Freeder said it will ultimately come down to how well the voters understand the controversy.
“The real question for both campaigns is how big is this going to get over the next two or three months now that there is a grand jury report? And that really depends, I think, on the spending strategy and the messaging strategy by Moody and Uthmeier’s opponents in the general election,” Freeder said.
[DOWNLOAD: Free Action News Jax app for alerts as news breaks]
[SIGN UP: Action News Jax Daily Headlines Newsletter]
Click here to download the free Action News Jax news and weather apps, click here to download the Action News Jax Now app for your smart TV and click here to stream Action News Jax live.