TALLAHASSEE, Fla. — A state grand jury found that the DeSantis administration misappropriated $10 million from a Medicaid settlement by routing it into the Hope Florida Foundation in 2024, calling the transfer \u201cpart of a political scheme to fund political activities.\u201d<\/p>\n
The sealed grand jury report, obtained by CBS News Miami, is stamped Jan. 26 by the Leon County Clerk of Court\u2019s Office and had been kept out of public view since then.<\/p>\n
The allegations of fraud and abuse were first raised by state Rep. Alex Andrade of Pensacola. Andrade declined an invitation to appear on the newscast, saying he wasn\u2019t sure what he could legally say.<\/p>\n
The report details how a 2023 settlement between the state and Centene Corp. over Medicaid overbilling resulted in $57 million going to the state and $10 million going to Hope Florida, a community-based program intended to connect welfare recipients with private and church-based programs. Hope Florida was headed by Casey DeSantis, the governor\u2019s wife.<\/p>\n
According to the grand jury report, \u201cWithin days, the $10,000,000 was transferred to other organizations for political purposes because money was spent on a political campaign and went to the Republican Party of Florida.\u201d The report says the money was transferred from Hope Florida to the Republican Party and two political action committees \u201cfor political purposes,\u201d specifically to fund a campaign to defeat a ballot initiative that would have legalized recreational marijuana in Florida.<\/p>\n
The report cites state law governing where such funds should go, stating, \u201c… the funds shall be placed in the General Revenue Fund or in the trust fund that is associated with the agencies…\u201d The report says the transfers did not follow the law and that the money should have gone into the state\u2019s general fund.<\/p>\n
One of the PACs involved was chaired by the governor\u2019s general counsel at the time, James Uthmeier, who is now the state attorney general, according to the report.<\/p>\n
The grand jury report says Uthmeier contacted a group called Save Our Society From Drugs and advised it to apply for a grant from Hope Florida. Hope Florida then awarded the group $5 million a few days later, the report says. Within a week, the group gave $4.75 million to Uthmeier\u2019s PAC, Keep Florida Clean, according to the report. The report also says another PAC, Secure Florida\u2019s Future, funneled the money it received to Uthmeier\u2019s PAC.<\/p>\n
The report also says Andrade noticed the state never issued a press release about the Medicaid settlement, as other states had done, and that the state did not notify the Legislature or the public about the $10 million payment to Hope Florida. The report states, \u201c… the executive branch is supposed to notice the legislative branch when monies are coming in or going out and the purpose of the expenditure. Rep. Andrade indicates that no such notice was given…\u201d Andrade later publicly stated that Uthmeier and others engaged in a conspiracy to defraud the public of the $10 million, according to the report.<\/p>\n
Despite finding the money was misappropriated, the grand jury said it did not find enough evidence to bring criminal charges. \u201cDespite our finding that the money was misappropriated, we find insufficient evidence to charge anyone criminally,\u201d the report says.<\/p>\n
The report concludes, \u201cWe can plainly see that taxpayer money was misused for political purposes and we would like to see changes made to prevent this from happening again.\u201d It recommends the Legislature enact a law to prevent similar situations in the future, set requirements for how organizations can use taxpayer funds, and provide consequences for violations.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"TALLAHASSEE, Fla. — A state grand jury found that the DeSantis administration misappropriated $10 million from a Medicaid…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":382555,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[16],"tags":[232,234,233],"class_list":["post-382554","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tallahassee","tag-tallahassee","tag-tallahassee-headlines","tag-tallahassee-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/382554","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=382554"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/382554\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/382555"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=382554"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=382554"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=382554"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}