A Republican congressman shocked Florida’s political scene when he said that people working for Gov. Ron DeSantis were breaking the law by using $10 million from a Medicaid settlement for political activities last year.
No one has been charged, and people in the DeSantis administration have said they did nothing wrong. In spite of this, four former federal prosecutors told the Herald/Times that Rep. Alex Andrade might have a good case.
They said that at least eight different federal charges, such as theft of government funds and money laundering, could be looked into in connection with the money that went through the Hope Florida Foundation.
People who break these laws could spend decades in jail. The ex-prosecutors said that anyone who wasted Medicaid money could be caught.
It’s not clear if the federal government will look into it.
These former federal attorneys worked for the Department of Justice for a total of 86 years and were from both parties. They looked into the case for the Herald/Times. One used to work for the FBI and is now an assistant U.S. attorney. Others have been in charge of the department’s fraud section, fought drugs for the government and helped write laws against money laundering, and were deputy chiefs of the department’s asset forfeiture and money laundering section.
All four said that there is enough proof for the Department of Justice to start an investigation based on what they know so far about the $10 million.
In his role as a federal prosecutor in Miami, Charles Blau led a money laundering task force. He said, “Once Medicaid funds are involved, those funds belong to the state and not to the charity or political action committees.” “That being the case, I think they should be looked into for money laundering.”
The main question is whether the $10 million was Medicaid money.
In a quiet deal last year, the state paid the Medicaid giant Centene $67 million for overcharging for prescription drugs in Florida’s low-income health care program. The state’s Agency for Health Care Administration got $57 million as part of the settlement, and Centene was told to send the other $10 million to the Hope Florida Foundation, a state-created charity that supports Casey DeSantis’s plan to get Floridians off of government help.
It gave $5 million to two different groups. Then, the groups gave at least $8.5 million to a political committee run by DeSantis’s chief of staff at the time, James Uthmeier, that was against the ballot measure last year to legalize marijuana for recreational use. Following that, Uthmeier’s group sent $10.5 million to the Republican Party of Florida and $1.1 million to DeSantis’ political fund.
There were claims from DeSantis, Uthmeier, and other state officials that the $10 million wasn’t Medicaid money but rather a gift from the company to a good cause. Uthmeier is now the attorney general of Florida.
Bryan Griffin, a spokesman for DeSantis, said the “story is not true.”
“Once more, the Tampa Bay Times is putting a story over facts to get clicks,” he said in a statement. “Your activism goes too far.”
Jeremy Redfern, a spokesman for Uthmeier, said the story is “nonsense.”
In a statement, Redfern said, “I’m sure your hand-picked, attention-hungry former prosecutors told you everything you wanted to hear. Unfortunately for your story, the actual law enforcement agencies are not entertaining the state representative’s crazy conspiracy theories.”
The Herald-Times was told by former federal prosecutors and Medicaid experts that the state’s thinking for why the $10 million wasn’t Medicaid money was wrong. Andrade said that Florida’s books show that the DeSantis administration is giving the federal government back its part of the deal, which is $67 million.
According to the former prosecutors, it is likely illegal to use $10 million from a Medicaid payment for something other than what it was paid out for.
A former federal prosecutor for 30 years who specialized in Medicaid fraud and money laundering said, “There’s a very strong argument here… that this behavior is defrauding not only Florida but also the United States.”