This means Sen. Ileana Garcia won illegally
Disgraced former Sen. Frank Artiles surrendered to authorities Thursday, walking into the Turner Guilford Knight jail facility near the airport and depriving us the joy of a perp walk.
This comes a day after the State Attorney’s Office raided his Palmetto Bay home and left with computers and other devices, documents and boxes of stuff that could include wads of cash from his safe, which is from where, investigators found, Artiles pulled stacks of bills to pay Alex Rodriguez, the NPA plantidate he convinced to run in the Senate District 37 race.
Rodriguez, who agreed because he had money troubles, got more than 6,000 votes and likely affected the election, in which television personality Ileana Garcia beat former Sen. Jose Javier Rodriguez by a scant 32 votes.
The allegations include that Artiles paid Rodriguez more than $55,000 — the agreed price was $50K — to run after he first pressured him to change from Republican to NPA.
Read related: Jose Javier Rodriguez Senate loss in rigged race must be investigated fully
“Sadly, Frank Artiles knew he could manipulate Florida’s electoral system,” Miami-Dade State Attorney Kathy Fernandez-Rundle said at a press conference announcing the charges. Artiles and Rodriguez were each charged with making or receiving illegal contributions and false swearing. Seems like peanuts but two of the charges are third degree felonies that could earn them a sentence of up to five years in prison.
“Running a ghost candidate is not a crime in Florida,” Fernandez-Rundle said. “Is it an attack on our Democracy? Is it a dirty political trick? Absolutely.”
The 25-page arrest affidavit is chock full of interesting details, like these:
- The first time the mastermind contacted Alex Rodriguez was at 4 a.m. on March 15 via Facebook.
- There are images of text messages where Artiles is repeatedly telling Rodriguez to change his party affiliation to NPA.
- Artiles knew that Alex Rodriguez was living in Boca Raton but was happy that his driver’s license still had the old Palmetto Bay address.
- In addition to the different wads of cash, Artiles paid the nearly $6,800 fee for the private school for Alex Rodriguez’s child. He did it with a corporate card. Artiles also directly paid the plantidate’s rent one month.
- Alex Rodriguez kept asking for money for some business transactions and Artiles kept pulling stacks of cash from his safe. But he would tell the plantidate that he wanted 30% of whatever profits he would get.
- Alex Rodriguez made a total of five charges on Artiles’ credit card from October 23 to Nov. 2 totaling more than $7,500.
- Artiles wanted to buy his daughter a used Range Rover and Rodriguez told him he could get one at auction for $10,900. It was a lie. There was no car. Rodriguez felt that Artiles would never live up to his end of the bargain.
- Rodriguez thought Artiles was connected enough to help him get a multi-million dollar PPE contract. It never happened.
Fernandez-Rundle said there was nothing to indicate Garcia participated in the fraud. “We have not uncovered evidence that Sen. Garcia was a part of Frank Artiles’ plotting,” she said.
But does it matter? Garcia was elected through the illegal actions of someone in her party! She was elected by fraud. There should be some kind of mechanism where someone who is elected by fraud is removed from office.
And does anybody really believe that Artiles was spending his own money?Please. There should be more charges coming.
Because it wasn’t only the $55K and change he paid Rodriguez to run, Artiles or someone working with him also paid for several mailers through a political action committee painting Rodriguez as a progressive independent. The Our Florida PAC, with a Kendall Drive address, had one single contribution of $370,000 from a non-existing company with a UPS in Atlanta.
Read related: Raid on Frank Artiles home could be justice, could be political preemption
Does anyone really believe that Artiles — who has been working as a lobbyist since he had to resign from the Senate over his racist rant — had that kind of money lying around legitimately? Are investigators going to talk to the people who allegedly run that PAC?
What about the “third party” identified in the affidavit, the one who met Rodriguez at First Horizon bank in Palmetto Bay and gave him $9,000 cash on Nov. 11 to pay his legal bills? Who is that person? What did they know and when?
Even the attorney for the plantidate says there were other “co-conspirators” involved.
“Frank Artiles and his co-conspirators knew they couldn’t beat José Javier Rodríguez in a fair election so they rigged it,” said William Barzee, who is representing Rodriguez. “Artiles cynically targeted and used a vulnerable ‘friend’ with a great name to run in the race in order to confuse voters and steal the election.”
Artiles himself told Rodriguez “we have money in an account” when he offered to pay him the $50,000 — $25K before and $25K after the election.
We!
He did not act alone. Authorities should continue to investigate until everyone is caught. Ask for the maximum sentence and negotiate down.
Both Artiles and Rodriguez were released Thursday. The plantidate got released on his own recognizance. The former senator had a $5,000 bond.
Here is a copy of the arrest affidavit:
Frank Artiles arrest warrant March 18 by Political Cortadito on Scribd
Frank Artiles arrested for sham state senate election — but was he alone? added by Ladra on
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[…] Read related: Frank Artiles arrested for sham state senate election — but was he alone? […]
[…] Sen. Frank Artiles — who has seen resigned in shame from office for a racist rant and been arrested for his role in a sham state senate candidate — tried to hold the legislation hostage in retaliation for Blanco’s support of a fellow […]
Who provided the money Frank Artiles funneled to Alex Rodriguez? Who gave the dude piles of cash?
Dear Eamon DeVarela, nobody suggested any kind of campaign czar, and actually I blame myself and the rest of the so-called “liberal media” for not having done our due diligence earlier. You can bet we are paying attention now.
The plantidate was furnished with campaign mailers, at least a couple if not $370K worth (more on that later), that had progressive (read: Democrat) messaging coupled with Republican attacks calling the real Sen. Rodriguez a socialist. It was a concerted effort. A conspiracy, if you will. Soon to be explained in a follow up story.
Meanwhile, your family comparison is pale. I shouldn’t pay for the crime my father or brother or sister committed, but if I got my very important job through her fraud, maybe I should be fired. Just sayin’. Let her run again on an even playing field and see what happens.
But also, thanks for reading. I will post more documents because people like it. And stay tuned, there is more to come. Always. This is Miami-Dade.
Love, Ladra
Biden fell down the stairs of Air Force One, 3 times. Talk about that. Talk about how gas has risen almost a dollar since mid January when the presidential election was stolen. Talk about that and then maybe somebody will take you seriously as a journalists, until then you are a joke!
If Jose Javier Rodriguez needed a plantidate to win the Senate race, then the GOP would not need a plantidate to win the Senate race back from him. They could have won it back by playing fair. But they barely won it even by stealing. So claiming that they needed to steal it last time does not make sense.
“Garcia was elected through the illegal actions of someone in her party! She was elected by fraud. There should be some kind of mechanism where someone who is elected by fraud is removed from office.”
Ladra, Ladra, Ladra where do I start?
1- If a member of your family were convicted of fraud and you had nothing to do with it should you be made to pay restitution? Using your logic, the answer would be YES. In fact Family members are closer to you than people that are just in your party.
2- The person accused of fraud in this case Mr. Artiles if convicted or if he pleads guilty I’m sure will be punished for these Illegal acts. But KFR stated that there is no indication that Ileana Garcia was a party to the fabricating or paying the plantidate, if that holds there is NO reason to remove her from office.
3- These ghost or phantom candidates are not exclusive to one party or another unfortunately these shenanigans are practiced by both parties. See recent elections in Houston Texas and Camden New Jersey with ghost or phantom candidates.
4- We have enough laws to combat this they just need to be applied more often (like they are now), but we must be careful of adding more laws and I can assure you laws questioning a candidate’s intent will be legally challenged and deemed unconstitutional. Who decides if candidate’s intent is acceptable? A committee of partisans? A campaign czar?
5- Lastly anyone that was going to vote for Jose Javier Rodriguez (with DEM next to his name) and instead “mistakenly” voted for Alex Rodriguez (With NPA next to his name) should have his voter registration card confiscated (and maybe sterilized). I’m sure the people that voted for Alex Rodriguez are tired of both parties (or avid MLB fans) and whether that’s the case or not the election is certified and if she (IG) did not partake in the hanky panky the election should stand.
Regardless of whether I agree with all of it, the article was informative and THANK YOU for posting the affidavit, you are greatly appreciated.
How did you arrive at your conclusion that Ileana Garcia “won illegally”? That’s typical Libtard nonsense. She won fair and square because 32 more people voted for her instead of the other guy… BTW, talking about a “ghost candidate” Can you name one notable accomplishment of his? Yeah… I didn’t think so.
Lots of election fraud happens.
https://hereistheevidence.com/
Porque Fernandez _ Rundle No Investiga Los Politicos de MDC ? Son Todos de Su PiìÑa?
This is just Republicans stealing elections. Again. Now in 2021 Republicans propose 200+ bills to make it harder for voters to vote.
Ladra,
How about the last Senate race for District 37? Wasn’t there a plantidate that tipped the race in favor of Jose Javier Rodriguez? Why is you reporting so slanted in favor of the Democrats? Why do you participate in the one sided corruption of Democrats not being held accountable for the same actions of Republicans?