WASHINGTON — The DeSantis administration “misappropriated” funds when it sent $10 million from a Medicaid settlement to the Casey DeSantis-aligned Hope Florida Foundation, a grand jury found, according to a leaked report.
Yet because the grand jury was unable to identify a clear-cut culprit for the misappropriation, it didn’t recommend anyone be criminally charged, according to a copy of the report obtained by CBS News.
“Despite our finding that the money was misappropriated, we find insufficient evidence to charge anyone criminally,” the report said, according to the outlet. “Nobody will take responsibility for deciding the $10 million of taxpayer money would go to Hope Florida… or had any memory of who made it.”
“We recognize that this would be an impediment to criminal prosecution,” the report added, according to CBS. “While we can’t prove who is responsible, we 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.”
Hope Florida somehow got $10 million of the $67 million available to Florida in a settlement from the health care firm Centene Corporation and a Sunshine State agency for overbilling taxpayers for prescription drugs.
From there, the funds flowed to the Republican Party of Florida and two political action committees with ties to James Uthmeier, who was the governor’s chief of staff at the time but now serves as the state’s attorney general.
Those funds were then used to fight Amendment 3 in 2024, which would’ve legalized marijuana in Florida for recreational use by adults, but was voted down.
“This baseless smear has been debunked over and over again,” Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis’ communications director Alex Lanfranconi told The Post.
“In fact, if any confidential grand jury report was leaked to the press, that’s the only crime committed.”
Hope Florida is Casey’s social welfare initiative that works to make poor people self-sufficient and independent over the long term. The Hope Florida Foundation is a charitable group tied to that initiative. The scandal blew up around the time that Casey was rumored to be considering a run for governor.
Her husband is term-limited. Ultimately, she didn’t throw her hat in the ring, and Rep. Byron Donalds (R-Fla.) has since won the GOP nod.
DeSantis himself ripped into the Hope Florida saga as a “hoax” and told reporters Wednesday, “I wasn’t involved in the settlement agreement, but I’m very happy with how everything was done.”
One of the key players who steered the money was Uthmeier, the grand jury noted.
“Testimony identified him as having involvement in directing the money after it went to Hope Florida. Testimony also revealed that Mr. Uthmeier’s Keep Florida Clean, a political action committee, was the prime recipient of the majority of the $10 million taxpayer funds,” the report said, per CBS News.
Then-Attorney General Ashley Moody (R), who is now a senator, “authorized” her deputy at the time to sign the settlement agreement. The grand jury zinged the deputy for signing it “without conducting his due diligence to ensure the proper appropriation of taxpayer funds.”
At a Thursday press conference, Uthmeier called it a “politically motivated witch hunt driven by the Democrats and a far-left Democrat state attorney.”
“This hoax has been debunked time and time and time again,” he added. “I’m not allowed under Florida law to comment on the report, so I can’t say if it’s true or not, but if it is indeed true, it shows a couple things. First, it shows that there was no probable cause found that anybody did anything wrong.”
Neither DeSantis, Moody, nor Uthmeier were summoned before the panel.
The grand jury lamented that “there was no oversight to ensure proper usage of the taxpayer money” because the settlement didn’t impose restrictions on the money.
“The Florida Legislature should enact a law to prevent this situation from occurring,” the grand jury report suggested. “For example, a law that says any monies received by the state from any source must be deposited into the General Fund, and there should be real consequences for anyone violating this law.”
