A.G. Gancarski
New questions are being raised by Florida Democrats about Gov. Rick Scott and the New Republican PAC after a polling memo released by the committee Thursday.
The poll was released by the PAC Mar. 29 and conducted from Mar. 10 to Mar. 13.
Gov. Scott entered the Senate race on Apr. 9; at the time the poll was conducted and the memo was circulated, the PAC was still devoted to President Donald Trump.
The FDP asserts that, in light of a federal elections complaint filed by End Citizens United against the committee for allegedly raising “soft money” in support of Scott’s eventual candidacy, this is one more piece of evidence of “illegal fundraising.”
“The dates of this poll are the latest piece of evidence demonstrating Scott will break the rules and game the system to advance his own political interests … and now he needs to answer for this obvious and disturbing development,” asserted spokesman Sebastian Kitchen.
Scott disclaimed responsibility for the PAC in Jacksonville Wednesday.
“As you know, I’m only responsible for the campaign account. The campaign account is what we’re responsible for,” Scott said.
“You’d have to reach out to people at New Republican. We’re very transparent in what we do,” Scott added. “I’m responsible for the campaign account. You have to separate it when you have federal races.”
End Citizens United had a response to that Thursday.
“We appreciate Rick Scott’s advice to ‘reach out to the people at New Republican.’ We’d like to remind Rick Scott that as chairman of New Republican, he is the ‘people’ responsible and accountable for this violation,” said Adam Bozzi, communications director of End Citizens United.
“We can only imagine his confusion trying to manage so many campaign committees and raise so much soft money. It truly is a tangled web. But, the fact is, Rick Scott still needs to give Florida voters an answer as to why he broke election law to advance his own political ambitions,” Bozzi added.
