Left: Florida State Sen. Ileana Garcia, who filed the legislation; Right: Donald Trump. (The Florida Senate; (AP Photo/Charlie Neibergall)
Florida Republicans are promoting a new law that would pay former President Donald Trump’s myriad legal defense bills with public funds — to the potentially high-priced tune of several million dollars.
The proposed legislation, Senate Bill 1740, was introduced earlier this month by State Sen. Ileana Garcia, a Republican and longtime Trump stalwart who represents parts of Miami-Dade County.
The two-page bill would create a new section of the Sunshine State’s public campaign finance law to establish the “Defending Freedom Fighters Trust Fund.” The fund would allot “up to $5 million” that could be tapped by a “qualified person” if they are running for the U.S. presidency as a Florida resident and face criminal charges.
Under the terms of the proposed statute, the trust funds “must be used to provide grants to qualified persons subject to political discrimination to pay for legal fees incurred as a result of criminal charges brought by a U.S. public entity.”
The funds would be administered by the Florida Department of Revenue and the bill would grant the department “the sole authority to determine if a person has been subject to political discrimination,” subject to as-yet-established rules promulgated by the agency.
“The department shall distribute grants to a qualified person in an efficient manner, prioritizing funding based on the severity of criminal charges and the causal connection between the charges and the political affiliation of the qualified person,” the bill reads.
While SB 1740 itself is not specific — or particularly strenuous in terms of means-testing — the would-be beneficiary was not in doubt.
“We’ve got a Florida Man — Donald Trump — running for President, and he’s facing ongoing legal challenges from Democrats in New York, Washington DC, and Atlanta,” Florida Chief Financial Officer Jimmy Patronis said in a Monday press release announcing the legislation.
In New York, Trump is facing state-level charges for allegedly falsifying business records related to the Stormy Daniels hush-money affair; in the nation’s capital, he is facing federal charges for alleged insurrectionary activities on Jan. 6, 2021; in the Florida federal system, he also faces charges for allegedly violating classified document laws and conspiracy to cover-up retention of those documents; in Atlanta, Trump is facing racketeering (RICO) charges for his well-documented efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election.
“The Left is really good at weaponizing the courts, and because President Biden is so unpopular, they’re not just trying to beat Trump at the ballot box, they’re trying to throw him behind bars, which is outrageous,” Patronis went on. “We need this Freedom Fighters Fund because as the Free State of Florida, we’re facing an onslaught of attacks from the federal government against the Sunshine State. If we can help and support a Florida candidate for the White House, that’s just good from a dollars and cents perspective.”
In sum, as of this writing, the 45th president has been personally charged with 91 separate criminal charges by three different offices.
Trump is currently on track to secure the 2024 GOP presidential nomination and is well-positioned, in terms of popular support measured by various recent opinion polls, to emerge victorious in a likely rematch with President Joe Biden. In fact, various media organizations have noted that Trump’s popular support, again in terms of opinion polling, steadily increased with each successive indictment.
Still, defending nearly 100 criminal charges is a daunting financial task. The ex-president’s allies appear intent on relieving the financial burden — or at least to be perceived as trying to do so as Trump is poised for his third straight election cycle atop the GOP ticket.
“We’re in the midst of an historic moment where we’re watching an election that’s trying to be stolen by Left wing prosecutors, the Biden Administration and even Blue States,” Garcia said on Monday. “They’re not trying to win at the ballot box; they’re trying to keep President Trump off the ballot by weaponizing the courts. Having a Floridian in the White House is good for our state — and anything we can do to support Florida Presidential candidates, like President Trump, will not only benefit our state, but our nation.”
According to the press release, the trust fund “legislation would frontload $5 million from the state’s Public Campaign Finance — Matching Funds Program” and “backfill the funding from voluntary donations via driver’s license registrations.”
“From all the decisions the federal government makes with regard to military installations, to roads, to disaster aid — it’s in Florida’s best interest to make sure their champion for the President is allowed a fair shot at the White House without being taken down by some fake witch-hunt,” Patronis went on to say.
Garcia, the 2016 director for Trump’s Latino outreach division, has defended the former president’s controversial comments about Mexican Americans and his opposition to illegal immigration.
A devoted member of the far-right, Garcia, in 2022, espoused the perspective that being gay and/or having gender dysphoria is a phase. During a debate about the so-called “Don’t Say Gay” bill, the Cuban American legislator reportedly said “gay is not a permanent thing, LGBT is not a permanent thing,” according to Florida Politics.
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