Embattled Rebekah Jones reactivated her GoFundMe page Monday night, pulling in thousands under the guise of exposing the “truth.”
Jones, who remains suspended on Twitter for violating rules against “platform manipulation and spam,” made the announcement in a post on her Instagram account. The self-professed ‘data scientist’ openly relaunched one of her six-figure fundraising pages, pulling in nearly $5,000 over the course of 14 hours. The refurbished campaign, cryptically named “Help Florida Scientist,” includes several reasons for its restart, including “fighting back” against Governor Ron DeSantis and “hiring a lawyer” to bring the Governor’s press secretary “to justice.”
The newly titled fundraiser, which was created last December, has raised over $306,000 since going live.
“Now that I’m officially a whistleblower under Florida law, § [phone redacted], you would think the governor would back off this insane war he’s been waging against me, science and data since last May. But no. Last week, the woman who is going to trial next month for stalking and harassing me all year boasted about how her ilk got me suspended from Twitter and silencing my voice,” Jones says in the most recent update, highlighting her feud with DeSantis’ press secretary Christina Pushaw.
Pushaw, who was recently tapped to serve as DeSantis’ new press secretary, has been an outspoken opponent of Jones well before assuming her role inside the Governor’s office. Pushaw first got onto the radar of the DeSantis administration for her willingness to call out the now thoroughly discredited “whistleblower” in a series of investigative stories, including a blockbuster exposé in Human Events in February.
Pushaw says that the “stalking” allegation is an attempt to smear her for exposing Jones’s lies.
While an upcoming case against Pushaw remains active, others argue the trial is open for “purely bureaucratic reasons.”
According to journalist Charles C. W. Cooke — who exposed the data designer’s long list of lies in a larger National Review piece — Jones did file an interim peace order against Pushaw, but before that interim peace order could be examined by a court, Jones filed a citizen complaint claiming that Pushaw was in violation of it.
“Pushaw, Jones suggested, is ‘facing criminal charges’ for having violated a restraining order that Jones had taken out against her. In support of this assertion, Jones posted a screenshot from the District Court of Maryland’s website that, she implied, confirms that something is awry,” Cooke noted in his article.
“As is typical, Jones’s many followers have taken this as gospel. But it’s not. In fact, it’s yet another falsehood. Moreover, it is perfectly emblematic of what Jones has done throughout her attempt to convince people that Florida is cooking the books, which is to claim serious wrongdoing by someone else that, upon closer examination, turns out to be serious wrongdoing of her own.”
Cooke continues in the article, detailing that on April 30th, Jones’s petition to extend the initial interim peace order was denied by a judge in the District Court of Maryland for Montgomery County (Case No. 0602SP003672021) on the grounds that the “petitioner could not meet required burden of proof.”
Specifically, the judge explained to Jones that journalism is not harassment; that Americans are free to examine the falsifiable claims of public figures; and that there was no evidence of harassment, of any likelihood of future harassment, or of any item that “would be the basis of relief,” Cooke continued.
“Although the interim peace order was immediately voided by the judge’s decision, the paperwork for the secondary complaint is still awaiting processing. Because there is no legitimate underlying peace order for Pushaw to have violated, this secondary claim will have to be dropped (or nolle prossed, in the lingo). But, for purely bureaucratic reasons, that hasn’t happened yet, and so . . .
“Jones is now pretending that there is an open “criminal” case against Pushaw, when there is no such thing.”
On the District Court of Maryland’s website, the restraining order is now listed as “Closed,” with the result reading, “This order is denied because: There is no statutory basis for relief.”
This isn’t the first time Jones has pushed false narratives or used her platform to solicit contributions.
Jones capitalized on her professional martyrdom in 2020. First reported by The Capitolist last year, Jones set up multiple fundraisers — at the same time — to “pay her bills ” and establish a “legal defense fund” against DeSantis. Her current fundraising account was originally set up to raise money for “legal reasons” after the Florida Department of Law Enforcement (FDLE) issued a search warrant on Dec. 7.
“This campaign was designed to allow large donors to help me fight this case with clear and visible accounting of every dollar I receive,” Jones said in a message on Dec. 10. “Some of these expenses include:
Lawyer’s fees, private investigators, an armed security guard for my home since the police published my home address and contact information online, moving expenses so my family can get out of the Governor’s reach, and any costs associated with this fight that I may not be anticipating, but will be reported back to this page as they occur.”
Jones also profited off her initial fundraiser — created on May 23, 2020 after she was sacked from the Florida Department of Health (FDOH) — well after claiming that the last day to donate was on Sept. 30, 2020.
“Today is the last day of my GoFundMe fundraiser,” Jones wrote in an update on Sept. 30, 2020. “Fundraising takes time and energy. Between my work volunteering with COVID Action and The Covid Monitor, raising two kids, suing the state, writing a book, and searching for a job whenever ‘after’ finally arrives, I’m not flush with time.
“If you could share this site in the next 15 hours to those who may be willing to help pay my salary, buy any needed equipment, and buy/keep cloud space for our national program, I would be very thankful,” the message continues. “And to everyone who has already donated – more than 5,000 people across the country – thank you so much. I never imagined anything like this would happen to me, and because of all of you, I believe it was for the better.”
While her first GoFundMe campaign has ended, Jones accepted donations as recent as five months ago.
In total, both fundraisers have raised over $566,000.
In the renewed fundraiser, Jones also alluded to her potential bid against Congressman Matt Gaetz. Last week, Jones announced that she was running against Gaetz, who is embroiled in a federal sex trafficking investigation. She has since walked back her run, purging any mention of that bid from social media.
Despite residing in Maryland, Jones further teased the campaign for Florida’s 1st Congressional District in an updated message on her GoFundMe, before pointing out that her fight against DeSantis and the government was her top priority.
“I want to hear YOUR ideas on the best way to fight back. I’m considering a run for Florida’s first congressional district, against sex trafficker and seemingly vapid Matt Gaetz,” Jones wrote.
“But first, I need help hiring a lawyer to bring DeSantis’ newest hire, my stalker, to justice, find to fight government censorship by extension with Twitter, and your ideas on what the road ahead might look like with the support of all the amazing people who have helped me along this journey.”
The Capitolist reached out to Jones for comment. She responded, disputing the claim that there is no case against Pushaw.
“Pushaw will be put on trial by the state of Maryland for her crime of violating the order next month; trial is set for July 13, 2021 at 2:00 PM. Case number is 6D00409037,” Jones said in an email.
“I intend to be there and with counsel this time, as the only reason no permanent order was put in place in April was because I was unaware of procedures for submitting evidence, and thus the judge could not enter into evidence the hundreds of pages of harassing and erratic tweets, messages and emails.”