Shane Desguin and Patricia Carpenter filed formal complaints regarding Florida Governor Ron DeSantis’ attempts to withhold travel records from public disclosure.
As state employees, they were caught in the middle of a fight between Sunshine laws and DeSantis’ humiliating failed campaign for President.
As public servants, they had to provide public records to the media as required under Florida law. But DeSantis sought to keep those records - and all the details within – secret from the public.
So the two employees did what most people would do in any other (normal) state: Filed a complaint.
Then the Florida Department of Law Enforcement (FDLE) investigation began.
In almost an exact reproduction of what happened to me after I told my superiors I intended to file a complaint regarding orders to post misleading data to the COVID-19 dashboard, the DeSantis smear machine has sought out to destroy two people who stood up to him and for doing what was not only right, but required by law.
In a 126-page report, FDLE detailed its invasive and retaliatory actions, attempted to defame the employees, accused them of “insubordination,” implied illicit sexual affairs, and even asked Tallahassee prosecutors to file criminal charges against them.
They even went after the children of one of the whistleblowers.
Their attorneys have rightfully pointed out DeSantis’ pattern of “dealing with” whistleblowers:
Fire, attack, defame, threaten, arrest, charge, silence.
This time, state attorney Jack Campbell refused to play ball (expect his tenure to end – as it should for the many times he agreed to file (and later dismiss) charges against DeSantis’ enemies).
Gary Fineout of Politico – one of DeSantis’ biggest cheerleaders and paid propagandists – got his hands on this 126-page report before anyone else.
Why he repeated the allegations made without any fact-checking or reference to the many laws broken by the creation of the report to begin with probably speaks to how he got the report – to make those claims public so they could be published.
It’s not only shameful, it’s illegal to retaliate against a whistleblower.
That the FDLE sought bogus criminal charges against these two former employees is yet another reason for the Department of Justice to intervene in Florida and stop the persecution of whistleblowers engaging in protected activity – even (especially) if that requires locking up all of those involved.
Someone, anyone needs to step in and protect those who speak truth to power.
Comes as no surprise to anyone here does it?