The government took $10 million meant for sick children, handed it to political insiders, and a grand jury spent months investigating what happened.
Now the report is finished – and the very people named in it are deciding whether you ever get to read it.
Florida’s attorney general won’t say whether he’s blocking it, the US senator who approved the transfer won’t answer questions, and an election is three weeks away.
HERE IS WHAT THEY DON’T WANT YOU TO KNOW
Florida sued a Medicaid company called Centene for overbilling the state $67 million.
The state won.
That money was supposed to expand health care for children.
Instead, DeSantis’ administration rewrote the settlement – diverting $10 million through Casey DeSantis’ Hope Florida Foundation and into political action committees run by DeSantis’ own chief of staff, James Uthmeier.
Those PACs spent the money defeating Florida’s 2024 ballot amendments on marijuana and abortion.
A Republican state representative named Alex Andrade – not a Democrat, a Republican from Pensacola – led the Florida House investigation and called it exactly what the evidence showed: “This is money laundering.”
He referred his findings to both the U.S. Justice Department and the Leon County State Attorney.
https://twitter.com/AlexVindmanHQ/status/2082135379889488040?s=20
A grand jury convened in October 2025, investigated for months, and issued a report.
You cannot read it.
THE PROMOTIONS TELL YOU EVERYTHING YOU NEED TO KNOW
Ashley Moody was Florida’s attorney general when she approved the $10 million transfer to Hope Florida – without requiring any of the safeguards her own office normally demands.
No controls. No questions. No guardrails.
Two months after the ballot amendments failed, DeSantis promoted Moody to the United States Senate.
He promoted Uthmeier – the man whose PACs received the funds – to Florida attorney general.
He promoted John Guard, Moody’s chief deputy, to state judge.
Barbara Petersen, executive director of the Florida Center for Government Accountability, put it plainly: “Every one of those people involved came out on top. They got a promotion.”
That’s the swamp.
Not the Washington, DC swamp.
The Tallahassee swamp.
Same playbook, different zip code.
THE REPORT THAT COULD TELL FLORIDIANS WHAT HAPPENED IS STILL LOCKED AWAY
The cover-up isn’t subtle.
The people doing it aren’t even pretending.
Uthmeier – the man whose PACs received the diverted funds, now Florida’s chief law enforcement officer – was asked directly whether he moved to keep the grand jury report sealed.
His answer: “I don’t think anybody cares about this topic any more than the liberal media.”
https://twitter.com/leonardkl/status/2081429193695416624?s=20
That’s not a denial.
That’s a man who knows exactly what’s in that report telling you to stop asking.
Three case numbers tied to the grand jury proceedings in Leon County are currently sealed.
The Florida Center for Government Accountability is fighting in court to force the report public – arguing that voters have a legal right to know what a grand jury found about their own officials before they cast a ballot.
Petersen told reporters: “This is likely the largest political scandal in modern Florida political history involving the top players of state government – potentially the U.S. Senator, the governor, the attorney general – and it’s all secret.”
When CBS Miami asked Moody whether she knew the Medicaid money would go toward political campaigns, she declined to answer.
When Andrade’s committee sought to question her during the House investigation, her office went silent.
The special election for her Senate seat is August 18th.
The grand jury report covering her role in this scandal is still locked in a Tallahassee courtroom.
Conservatives have said for years that the system protects the powerful – that people with the right connections play by different rules than everyone else.
Here’s what that looks like when it happens inside your own party: a grand jury investigates, issues its findings, and the men who got promoted for their roles in the scheme are the same men holding the key to the courthouse door.
Florida voters deserve to read that report before August 18th. Â
Sources:
- John Pacenti, “Sen. Ashley Moody faces more scrutiny over $10M Hope Florida scandal,” USA Today Network-Florida, July 28, 2026.
- “Florida Senator Ashley Moody faces renewed scrutiny over her role in Hope Florida scandal,” CBS Miami / WFOR-TV, July 27, 2026.
- “Attorney General James Uthmeier keeps silent on if he’s blocking Hope Florida grand jury report,” CBS Miami, April 12, 2026.
- “Grand jury returns presentment in Hope Florida investigation,” Florida Trident / WGCU, February 25, 2026.
- “As election looms, Hope Florida players could keep grand jury report secret,” Miami Herald, 2026.
- Alex Andrade, quoted in CBS Miami reporting on Hope Florida investigation, August 2025.
