Long before Donald Trump rode on top of the conspiracy theory-laden, QAnon fabricated deep state, Hatter tea party wave into office, the conservative movement stoked the unsubstantiated conspiracy theories of voter fraud perpetrated on a massive scale. Trump’s spent the past year very transparently focused on trying to figure out a way to harness the myth of Democratic voter fraud while promoting the usual anti-Democracy voter suppression techniques and laws that the GOP has been using for decades.
But, as CNN reports, so far there is only one election that shows any of the markings of bad faith machinations. Florida’s District 37 race between Democratic incumbent Jose Javier Rodriguez and Republican Ileana Garcia was decided by 32 votes, with Garcia being announced as the winner. I lied. There was a third candidate: unaffiliated mystery man Alex Rodriguez, who pulled in 6,377 votes. But, as numerous news outlets have reported, Rodriguez—Alex, not Jose Javier—seems to have done virtually nothing to run, but seems to have gotten all kinds of financial support from a mystery political action committee that had dark money infusions of hundreds of thousands of dollars in the last couple of weeks leading up to Election Day. Oh, also, Alex Rodriguez—not Jose Javier Rodriguez—had all kinds of flyers sent out where he espoused a ton of Democratic platforms. Pretty confusing, eh? Well, definitely more than 32 votes confusing.
Jose Javier Rodriguez has made sure to point this out to media outlets, saying this mystery Alex Rodriguez, a 55-year-old mechanic who suddenly threw his name into the ring and then never campaigned, clearly syphoned away votes. Javier Rodriguez has conceded his Miami-Dade County seat, but called for an investigation into these shenanigans “In order to achieve that, I believe this election requires a full investigation so that those who may have violated the law are held to account and so that such tactics are not used in future elections.”
Whether this shadowy third candidate cost Javier Rodriguez his seat is hard to know (see not hard to know), but considering that the man who continues to refuse appearing in public—this is a supposed candidate for state senate—ran on a platform of climate change and fixing health care, it feels pretty clear who they were appealing to. CNN reports that a “mysterious company called Proclivity, Inc. contributed $550,000 to a pair of newly formed political action committees in the state.” Those action committees, set up one month before Election Day, received this money the day after coming into existence.
The two Florida PACs that received the Proclivity contributions were both registered on the same date and time -- October 2 at 11:34 am, according to Florida Division of Elections documents.
One day later, one of the PACs -- Our Florida PC -- got $370,000 from Proclivity; the other -- The Truth PC -- got $180,000.
These PACs also sent money to similar spoiler-style candidates throughout Florida. Strange, eh? The two PACs were chaired by young women that no one has heard of before, and appear to be connected to a young Republican political strategist named Alex Alvarado. That’s peculiar. According to CNN, Alvarado’s business was paid $267,000 for political work.
Side note: CNN has not been able to contact or get an interview out of any of the people involved in this sketchy situation. The Washington Post also had a hard time finding the mysterious Alex Rodriguez.*
Same last name right next to one another, similar platform...
When Miami WPLG Local 10 reporter Glenna Milberg attempted to find Alex Rodriguez at the address he wrote down “when he qualified to run,” she found that he didn’t live there and had never lived there, and no one seemed to know who he was. She then went to his place of business, where a man answered as Alex’s “business partner,” saying that Rodriguez would not be back until the following day. Turns out that guy was Alex Rodriguez. Peculiar. Milberg then tracked down a third-party candidate like Rodriguez and he too was super dubious. You can watch that report below. CNN says that Rodriguez was charged with two counts of “felony grand theft,” to which he plead guilty to in 2012.
Alex Rodriguez telling a reporter he isn’t Alex Rodriguez.
The Miami Herald reports that prosecutors have opened an investigation into Alex Rodriguez, and have also had a bit of a time locating him as they have some questions. Alex Rodriguez is not the only “ghost candidate” to appear in close races on the ballots in Florida.
In State Senate District 9, Democrat Patricia Sigman lost to a Republican by just 2 percent of the vote. No one ever saw the supposedly liberal, third candidate.
“She had no website. She never participated in any of the debates or forums, never showed up anywhere. She wasn’t even registered to vote until she filed,” Sigman said.
WPLG’s Milberg then found a similar candidate, Celso D. Alfonso, who also ran. The similarities between these magical candidates are “striking” says the Washington Post:
Both men were registered as Republicans in 2018, and both qualified for this year’s election on the same day, with hand-delivered checks time-stamped within minutes of one another, according to the Herald. Their listed email addresses are nearly identical, too.
Alfonso denied having ads, though he did and they were sent out by the same mysterious PAC that sent out Rodriguez’s fliers. When presented by this fact, Alfonso said he paid for the fliers himself. When the reporter mentioned to him that that’s not what the filings say, Alfonso just said “No. It’s not now. I’m sorry, now it’s over,” seemingly attempting to plead both ignorance and the idea that since the election is over that was all there was to say.
And as for Proclivity, Inc.? It seems it was registered in Delaware in 2019 by a man no one can get in touch with named Richard Alexander. The only paper trail seems to lead to a mailbox in an Atlanta strip mall.
The good news is that President-elect Joe Biden has finally been able to move ahead with the important work of transitioning into the White House. There is a lot of work to be done and the current lame duck president has been a corrupt lame duck president for four years already. The current public health and economic crisis are symptoms of his leadership. The bad news is that the Trump administration has always been simply the most caustic and coarse versions of what the Republican Party stands for, and as crass and egregious as Trump may seem, he’s just saying what Republican officials and operatives really believe.
Watch the local report.
*Not the baseball player.
