Coral Gables mayoral recall PAC has dark money funding from web of PACs

Vince Lago PAC has much more interest money

The campaign to recall Coral Gables Mayor Vince Lago is not really a grassroots effort. And it’s not very transparent.

In its first campaign report filed this week, the End The Corruption political action committee chaired by longtime activist and perennial gadfly Maria Cruz reported collecting a nice round $50,000 in two days entirely from three other PACs in what can only be described as a labyrinth of dark money sources.

The End Corruption PAC, opened March 13, listed only three contributors in the first quarterly report of the year. Two are the exact same, $17,500 each from Mark PC — a PAC run by Tallahassee attorney Mark Herron, who hides campaign contributions for a living — and Florida Consumer Alliance, both on the same date, March 28. The other $15K came in a March 30 check from the similarly named Florida Workers’ Alliance, which has the same Tallahassee address as the Florida Consumer Alliance and also got a $15,000 contribution March 28 from MarK PC. It was the only contribution and expense recorded by Florida Workers Alliance this quarter.

In other words, it’s a labyrinth. It’s intentional. And it usually denotes special interests are involved.

Attorney David Winker, the PAC attorney, says people who want to give to the campaign are afraid to because of Lago’s retaliatory track record. “Residents had to do it this way or get crushed with code complaints,” he told Ladra.

And L’Ego does like to strike back. Lately, if you’re not 100% with him, you are the mayor’s sworn enemy. He literally gets in your face and says he is going to “crush” you. Just ask Fernando Yanes, owner of Bar77 on Giralda, who called the mayor a liar at a recent commission meeting and said Lago threatened to shut down his business for contacting another commissioner about helping him with his TV screens.

Cruz said Lago is threatening voters and lying to get them to not sign the petition. Hundreds, hundreds of residents, have said they agree with the recall but are afraid to put their name on the list that surely Lago will get and use. Even if you don’t like Lago, the last thing anybody wants is him going after you.

That’s the same thing happening to whoever the donor is or donors are and that is why they went to Herron, Cruz said, adding that she had nothing to do with it. “And I don’t want to. I just know it’s legal. We are following the law. We are doing everything we need to. They are not,” Cruz said referring to the Lago camp, which includes anonymous bloggers and people with felony stalking charges against them.

Even the people collecting the signatures have felt harassed and followed by Gables Police.

Dark money does not mean dark-minded sources, just that they are hidden in the shadows. It could be for good reason. It is understandable that whoever is behind this effort would want to use all the legal recourses they could to protect themselves from retaliation. Ladra has a few suspects, but none of them are the “out of town developers” that Lago is lying about to scare people and chill the recall effort. ¡Que descarado!

It might be either the police or fire unions, or both. Each has been at odds with Lago — who has repeatedly berated them in public — for months, if not years, releasing their own statements, including a web video released this week by the FOP. And, let’s face it, the mayor is their boss. You’d be scared, too.

It could also be the Miami-Dade Democratic Party, seizing the opportunity to embarrass a high-profile, rising Republican pretty boy. This is a theory thanks to the involvement of the Ven Vamos canvassing group, who was paid $25,678 (that’s the same group that helped with the 2020 Joe Carollo recall in Miami) and veteran political consultant Jeffrey Garcia, the onetime campaign consultant to former Congressman Joe Garcia who pleaded guilty in 2013 to soliciting voters’ absentee ballots illegally without their consent. Garcia hasn’t been paid by the PAC — which also bought $1,360 worth of shirts from Physical Advertising Works to make sure their canvassers could be easily identified — but he’s been widely rumored to be at the helm and Cruz has referred to him on more than one occasion.

Then again, our local Dems are really good at missing opportunities.

But just because it’s legal, doesn’t make it right. It’s a shame that a PAC that advocates for more transparency in Gables government has to be shrouded in such secrecy. And it’s a practice we’ve unfortunately seen before too many times.

Herron, who worked for both the Florida and National Democratic Committees, has managed hundreds of PACs across the state over the years, including one that attacked all the Hispanic candidates in the 2020 South Miami election on behalf of former Mayor Philip Stoddard. He specializes in hiding the true sources of negative hit pieces.

Mark PC also gave $2,500 this last quarter to the Miami-Dade Safe and Secure PAC, run by Christian Ulvert for county sheriff candidate James Reyes. Before he ran PCs, Herron represented clients like former Miami Lakes Mayor Michael Pizzi and worked on the ballot-challenging team for former presidential candidate Al Gore.

Read more about Herron on Voters’ Opinion. And in the Clean Up City of St. Augustine blog at http://cleanupcityofstaugustine.blogspot.com/2008/11/randy-brunson-florida-elections.html.

Meanwhile, voters shouldn’t believe that Lago is clean of special interests. His own PAC, Coral Gables First, reported zero contributions in this first quarter, but collected $165,800 in 2023. The big contributions include:

$25,000 from Biscayne Global Management, a Delaware-based company (more secrecy), identified as real estate developers.
$24,000 from Yacht Club at Luxcom, which sued the Village of Palmetto Bay after leaders there tried to block development of the old FP&L property, one of the largest undeveloped waterfront properties in the Miami-Dade County. They also gave $24,000 in 2022.
$18,000 from Aurelio Leyva, CEO of a manufacturing company in Miami,.
$10,000 from lobbyist Les Pantin, whose mother just happens to be the city administration’s gatekeeper and mouthpiece.
$10,000 from BTY Holdings, which specializes in real estate and infrastructure construction.
$5,000 from the owner of an office building at 2000 Ponce De Leon Boulevard, who purchased it in 2022 for $14 million.
$5,000 from real estate developer Henry Torres, founder and president of Astor Development Group.
$5,000 from Jason Gilg, Vice President of development and construction for Terra.
$5,000 from the Calta Group, which develops and builds large-scale hospitality and residential projects.
$5,000 each from lobbyist Eric Zichella.
$5,000 from healthcare magnate Mike Fernandez.
$2,500 from a red light camera company in Illinois.

The PAC spent $124,300 in the first quarter of the year. No election going on. That includes $50K to Jesse Manzano for consulting and research — it looks like his retainer is $10K a month — and $57,600 to Daniel Bustamante for consulting, research and web development in February.

That’s just the old PAC. The new PAC, Accountable Coral Gables — which was formed with the intent to put several charter amendments on the ballot — has raised $50,222 from many of the same sources. Fifteen of the 22 checks are from real estate and development interests, according to the finance report. Some new ones: Developer Sergio Pino chipped in $10K and former Gables Commissioner Frank Quesada, who, in 2022, loaned Lago and his shady pals $3.5 million in mortgage money.

The new PAC has spent more than $32,000 — about $23,000 with Bustamante, including a $10,714 phone bank, and $9,000 to Manzano for research.

So that’s not such a transparent grassroots effort, either.

PACs, Vince Lago, Vince Lago recall

Coral Gables mayoral recall PAC has dark money funding from web of PACs added by Ladra on April 11, 2024
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