The morning after a judge said he’s seen no evidence of wrongdoing in the vote counting in Broward County and urged all sides to “ramp down the rhetoric,” a top official for the Rick Scott campaign accused Democrats of committing “fraud” in court.
“The lawyers for Bill Nelson, Marc Elias, are in court trying to commit fraud in open public,” said Scott senior adviser Brad Todd during an interview on CNN Tuesday morning. “They’re trying to invalidate laws that have kept out invalid votes. Those laws are very clear in Florida to prevent fraud … and the Nelson campaign wants to count even votes that already have been deemed invalid by judges.”
Todd accuses Nelson’s campaign is seeking to throw out Florida’s anti-fraud laws in an effort to allow ballots that have been declared invalid under Florida law to be counted as part of the vote recount that is currently underway.
“Nelson’s campaign’s position is we should ignore Florida’s election laws,” Todd said. “You know Bill Nelson has been in office since I as 2-years-old. The question is does he want to have that long of a lifetime of career service to Florida to be unwritten and for his own legacy to be the guy who is the sore loser who wouldn’t go away?”
Todd also expressed believes the arguments being made by Democrats in this recount, which he describes the current vote margin of just under 13,000 votes as “insurmountable,” have an underlying motive.
“Plenty of candidates have conceded with margins of less than this,” Todd went on to say. “I think Bill Nelson and the Democrats are suing to throw out election law because they think they need to get rid of the election laws to defeat President Trump in 2020. It’s all about 2020.”
As claims continue to be made of fraud a week after the election, the state has set up a monitoring process for reporting and investigating claims of possible fraud and wrongdoing during the recount.
After sending letters to the Florida Department of Law Enforcement and Secretary of State this weekend critical of both agencies for not investigating claims of “irregularities” in the vote counting and handling of ballots from Tuesday’s election, Attorney General Pam Bondi and FDLE say they want “to assure Florida voters that we are actively engaged in monitoring processes for potential criminal activity.“
Bondi and FDLE released a joint statement late Monday evening announcing that procedures have been put into place to address allegations of voter fraud and criminal misconduct involving last week’s election
“FDLE has been in continuous contact with the Department of State and we continue to work jointly,” the joint statement says. ‘As allegations are received, FDLE will continue to vet and review those that may be indicative of criminal activity.”
The statement goes on to say that FDLE agents and analysts from the agency’s Office of Executive Investigations, Miami Regional Operations Center and members of the Commissioner’s Office will examine allegations of fraud and misconduct. It says a case will remain open while allegations are analyzed.
“FDLE will work closely with Attorney General Pam Bondi and the Office of Statewide Prosecution on any criminal investigation and subsequent prosecution. A Department of State voter fraud hotline and online reporting form is available. We encourage citizens to remain peaceful as the recount process continues,” the statement ends.