Former Florida Senator Found Guilty in ‘Ghost Candidates’ Scandal – Mother Jones

This story was reported by Headlighta nonprofit newsroom that investigates the powerful interests impeding climate action.

Former Florida State Senator Frank Artiles was convicted by a Miami-Dade Circuit Court jury Monday night, the latest fallout from the state’s 2020 “ghost candidate” scandal.

Artiles was convicted of three felonies in connection with $44,000 in payments to Alex Rodriguez, a nonpartisan candidate whose job was to siphon votes from Sen. Jose Javier Rodriguez, the Democratic incumbent. The six-person jury deliberated for seven hours before reaching its verdict. Artiles was acquitted on a fourth count of aiding and abetting false voter registration. Artiles sat stone-faced as the guilty verdicts were read.

“You won. They were successful. They beat JJR,” corruption prosecutor Tim VanderGiesen said in his opening statement. “You beat the incumbent named Rodriguez.”

“They stole an election,” he said.

Artiles’ defense attorney, Frank Quintero, had reminded jurors that ghost candidates are legal “as long as Florida election law is not violated.”

But that’s exactly what the jury found.

The term “ghost candidate” is used to describe a candidate who has no chance of winning but is running to hurt the chances of an actual competitor. Ghost candidate Rodriguez was part of an opaquely funded 501(c)(4), or “dark money,” operation facilitated by consultants working for Florida Power & Light, a subsidiary of the energy company NextEra.

Florida Power & Light CEO Eric Silagy, who has never been accused of wrongdoing, had ordered his subordinates to “go ahead.” [Sen. Rodriguez’s] Life is hell.” Silagy abruptly retired in January 2023 after Floodlight and its media partners reported FPL’s involvement in the ghost candidate scandal.

Artiles was charged with conspiracy, campaign contributions over the $1,000 limit and “false swearing in” for instructing Alex Rodriguez – who actually lived outside District 37 – to fill out paperwork to vote in the election.

Artiles, who faced up to five years in prison on each count, remained silent during the two-week trial. He was flanked by his lawyers Quintero and Frank Quiñon. Behind him in the Miami courtroom was a rotating cast of friends and family.

The charges stem from efforts to secure a Republican supermajority in the Florida Senate by fielding three ghost candidates to steal votes from Democratic candidates in key 2020 elections. The spoiler candidates were supported in part by a number of nonprofit organizations controlled by Jeff Pitts, then-CEO of Matrix LLC, a consulting firm that worked for Florida Power & Light, Floodlight and other news outlets reported

The nonprofits in question were 501(c)(4) organizations that are not required to disclose the identities of their donors, and prosecutors were unable to trace the money to its original source. On September 27, Florida federal judge Aileen Cannon dismissed a shareholder lawsuit accusing FPL’s parent company, NextEra Energy, of making misleading statements about its political activities.

From the utility’s perspective, as noted in our previous, in-depth story on the scandal, extending GOP dominance – by whatever means – would help meet the utility’s legislative priorities:

These priorities included avoiding liability for damages related to power outages resulting from Hurricane Irma; the ouster of JR Kelly, the state’s longtime (unlikable) consumer watchdog; and received approval from the Senate-confirmed Public Service Commission for Florida’s largest electric rate hike ever.

Senator Rodriguez’s defeat had the added benefit of bringing to his knees one of the most prominent proponents of rooftop solar, which reduces carbon emissions and lowers electric bills – and had waged a decades-long counterinsurgency campaign against FPL.

He lost to Ileana Garcia, founder of Latinas for Trump, by 32 votes.

Prosecutors said consultants involved in the scandal withheld subpoenaed documents. Key evidence in the form of hundreds of text messages between Artiles and Rodriguez also disappeared, it said.

Much of the trial revolved around the credibility of the state’s star witness, ghost candidate Alex Rodriguez, who admitted under cross-examination that he had a difficult relationship with the truth. To bolster his credibility, prosecutors laid out the broader effort to influence the 2020 election.

Their first witness was the reserved Pat Bainter, a North Florida peanut farmer and an influential staffer on the state’s Republican campaign committee.

In a pretrial deposition, Bainter, whose firm Data Targeting worked for GOP candidates, admitted that he paid Artiles $15,000 a month for six months for on-site research in the District 37 race, including fielding a spoiler candidate. Bainter also admitted that he sent a non-binding payment of $100,000 to a 501(c)(4) nonprofit organization controlled by Artiles.

Testimony and evidence presented in court revealed that Bainter held meetings with campaign advisers to Artiles and Garcia, who had a business relationship with Pitts, then CEO of Matrix.

Garcia’s campaign manager testified that Bainter was in charge of that campaign. Bainter also testified that his company worked for Garcia’s campaign.

Rodriguez took the stand late on the fourth day of the trial. Prosecutor VanderGiesen showed him the totals from the 2020 race, in which he received 6,000 votes.

“Did you receive these votes honestly?”

“No,” Rodriguez replied.

Rodriguez, who pleaded guilty in connection with the election and served six months of house arrest and three years of probation, also testified that Artiles offered him $50,000 to run as a spoiler: $25,000 before the election and $25,000 thereafter.

But he feared Artiles would never honor his promise to pay, so he “manufactured” a series of business deals involving construction equipment, diesel engines and COVID masks to extort money from Artiles. He also asked Artiles for help covering his rent and his daughter’s private school tuition, Rodriguez testified.

At one point, he admitted, he made up a story about a Range Rover he wanted to auction for Artiles and demanded the former senator pay $10,900.

His reason for all the scams? “I was afraid I wouldn’t get the $50,000.”

The defense criticized Rodriguez and sought to raise reasonable doubt about the nature of his transactions with Artiles. They portrayed the former senator as the victim of a series of fraudulent business deals and requests for financial help from Rodriguez. “The evidence will show that Rodriguez is a fraudster, a professional fraudster, a pathological liar,” Quintero told jurors.

On the witness stand, Rodriguez did not defend himself and answered Quintero’s increasingly forceful questions in a calm, monotone voice.

The defense’s central question was: Could the state irrefutably prove that the payments at the heart of the case were illegal campaign contributions?

“There is no other explanation,” VanderGiesen posited, “why the defendant is giving tens of thousands of dollars to Alex Rodriguez.”

When approached by a Floodlight reporter, Rodriguez refused to speak publicly until the end of the trial. He took the reporter’s phone number and said he would call. As he walked down the escalator, he winked at the reporter.

Shortly before the verdict was announced, the reporter also spoke with Artiles. Artiles called the process “a colossal waste of time.”

“The press will not report what is really happening,” he said.

The reporter replied that he would be happy to write the whole story – if he could ever find out exactly what it was.