ORLANDO, Fla. (AP) — Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis and other GOP officials were behind a plot to eliminate competition for his nomination and prevent a former Democratic state attorney whom the Republican governor ousted from office last year from winning back her job as Central Florida’s top prosecutor, according to a lawsuit filed this week.
The lawsuit was filed Tuesday by Thomas Feiter, a Republican candidate for the state attorney’s district covering metro Orlando, who lost in the Republican primary to Seth Hyman.
Hyman dropped out of the general election race earlier this month, running against Andrew Bain, a DeSantis-appointed candidate who is running without a party affiliation, and Democrat Monique Worrell, who replaced Bain after DeSantis suspended her in what opponents saw as a political move.
After dropping out of the race this month, Hyman endorsed Bain. No Republican was named by the state GOP to take Hyman’s place on the ballot for the November general election.
According to the indictment, Republican officials supported Hyman’s sham candidacy, knowing he would withdraw from the race after winning the primary.
The officials “intended, through their conspiracy and misconduct, to directly influence our election results in order to achieve their desired outcome and keep their previously appointed candidate (Andrew Bain) in office,” the lawsuit says.
The lawsuit alleges election fraud, violations of Florida election law and corrupt vote tampering. It asks that the results of the GOP primary be declared null and void due to corruption, misconduct and fraud.
Hyman called the lawsuit “completely frivolous and an abuse of the legal system” in an email Friday. A spokesperson for Bain’s campaign did not respond to an email Friday, and there was no response to an email sent to the governor’s office.
DeSantis alleged that Worrell failed to prosecute crimes committed by minors and failed to require mandatory minimum sentences for gun violence, endangering the public in her central Florida district.
Worrell said her August 2023 suspension was politically motivated, as it came while DeSantis was campaigning for the GOP presidential nomination. She argued that the state Constitution only allows an elected official to be suspended for flagrant misconduct, and that she was simply doing her job as she saw fit.
DeSantis also fired State Attorney Andrew Warren, a two-time Democrat elected to Tampa, last year because Warren signed promises that he would not file criminal charges against abortion seekers or providers of abortion or gender reassignment treatments. DeSantis also disagreed with his policy of not filing charges for certain low-level crimes.
