Finally. The pigeons are coming home to roost for Florida Governor Rick Scott and his clown car administration. The BaileyGate scandal which I wrote about
here and
here has taken on a life of its own and is not going away anytime soon. From the
Tallahassee Democrat:
The Florida Society of News Editors, the Associated Press and others are suing Gov. Rick Scott and members of the Florida Cabinet, saying they violated the Sunshine Law by using staff members as conduits to discuss the ouster of Florida Department of Law Enforcement chief Gerald Bailey.
The lawsuit, filed Tuesday in Leon Circuit Court, seeks a court finding that the governor and Cabinet members broke the Sunshine Law, which requires meetings of Cabinet members to be publicly noticed and held in open session, with minutes taken. The Sunshine Law, codified in statutes and the Florida Constitution, also applies to to meetings of staff when they are used as a liaison between board members to conduct de-facto meetings.
The lawsuit also asks for a permanent injunction barring Scott, Cabinet members and their aides and representatives from engaging in closed-door discussions about agency appointments."The governor violated the Sunshine Law by using conduits to engage in polling, discussions, communications and other exchanges with other members of the Cabinet regarding his unilateral decision to force the resignation of the FDLE commissioner and appoint a replacement without any notice to the public, without any opportunity for the public to attend and without any minutes being taken," the lawsuit states. "Because the governor appears to justify this conduct by claiming it is part of a longstanding convention and tradition, plaintiffs also seek injunctive relief."
So our 'teflon' governor seems to have lost his protective coating. This scandal has 'legs'. Let's see how Scott tries to wiggle himself out of this one.