This is a production of PBS Tampa, St. Petersburg, Sarasota.

[music] Coming up on WEDU, more accusations arise in the battle over the Hope Florida Foundation, a state agency, and the governor himself accusing a Tallahassee reporter of intimidating Hope.

Florida participants.

Is the Tampa Bay area headed into a weekend of ICE protests and demonstrations.

While the eyes of the nation continue to watch developments in Los Angeles.

And there's a major development in the Cross-Bay ferry connecting downtown St. Pete and downtown Tampa.

That's next on Florida This Week.

[music] Welcome back, everybody.

I'm Lissette Campos joining me on the panel this week.

We have Kirby Wilson, a politics reporter with the Tampa Bay Times.

We have Christina Diamond, the CEO of Ruth's List and a Democrat.

Rebecca Liebson is a real estate reporter for the Tampa Bay Times.

And Mike Fasano is the Pasco County Tax Collector and a Republican.

Thank you so much for joining me today.

We begin with more controversy surrounding the Hope Florida Foundation, a Florida newspaper, is now asked to cease and desist its investigative reporting.

Here's how the newspaper is responding.

The state Department of Children and Families has entered the troubled waters of the Hope Florida Foundation, a signature initiative of First Lady Casey DeSantis.

The Orlando Sentinel received a letter from the Department of Children and Families asking its investigative reporter to cease and desist activities, investigating how $10 million from a state Medicaid settlement ended up with the foundation.

The DCF letter sent to the newspaper accused its investigative reporter in Tallahassee of using threats to coerce foster families into making negative statements about the foundation.

DCF posting the June 6th letter on its social media.

Governor Ron DeSantis sharing and commenting on that DCF post on his X account, the DCF letter demanded the Sentinel reporter cease and desist what DCF calls, quote, the intimidation end quote of Hope.

Florida families interviewed for the story, which has yet to be published.

The executive editor of the newspaper calls that characterization, quote, completely false, end quote.

The newspaper published an editorial, including the newspaper's formal response to the state agency and the DCF letter in full, executive editor Roger Simons saying in part, quote, we stand by our stories and reject the state's attempt to chill free speech and encroach on our First Amendment right to report on an important issue.

End quote.

On background scrutiny of Hope, Florida began during this legislative session.

It centered around a $57 million Medicaid settlement involving Centene, the largest Medicaid administrator in the state was ordered to pay after admitting to overbilling Florida taxpayers millions of dollars in prescription drugs.

Of the full amount of the settlement, $10 million were directed to the Hope Florida Foundation, which then directed the funds to two nonprofits to campaign against constitutional amendment number three that would have legalized recreational marijuana.

Kirby, this development, I'd like to start with our reporters in the room.

This development is so unusual for a state agency to send something like this to a media outlet that's doing reported investigations or doing any kind of story.

I'd like to get your your perspective on this.

So I think there's a couple of things to understand about this.

Um, first of all, um, I wouldn't put too much stock in this letter because it wasn't signed by a lawyer and it wasn't addressed to a lawyer.

And those are some sort of key things you need in a legit cease and desist letter.

Um, but setting aside the actual facts of this, like setting aside what this reporter did, how they acted, I have full faith that they acted completely appropriately because I know this reporter and they've been a reporter for a long time in Tallahassee.

They don't coerce or intimidate people generally as a as a practice.

But just to set that aside, I think there's three big things we need to understand about Hope Florida and its three sort of misconceptions that the governor's office has.

And the first is that Hope Florida is this novel thing.

I mean, it is this initiative that connects people to wraparound services, um, to help people get out of the cycle of poverty.

Um, but other states have similar programs.

So when the governor says that this is a unique initiative that is sort of first of its kind in Florida.

It's not necessarily true.

The second thing is the governor's office believes that they are above questioning.

They believe that they do not deserve legitimate questions from news outlets to hold them accountable.

And that's something that it's just not how it works.

Like, you make more smoke by pulling stunts like this and trying to throw people off of reporters than you would by just simply answering the questions.

It's a it's a lesson that the governor's office has learned over and over again but refuses to sort of internalize.

And then the third thing is that, um, you know, there are questions about whether it's legitimate to use, uh, settlement money for Medicaid for political purposes.

And those are being investigated not only by reporters, but potentially by law enforcement.

And those aren't questions.

This isn't personal.

You know, this isn't about whether we think the governor is evil or he's doing a bad job.

It's just a matter of public accountability.

And so I think this reporter was following a legitimate line by interviewing the people that are sort of affected by these services to ask, how is it going?

And you know that it's understandable that the governor's office would bristle because it's very close to one of his signature initiatives.

But, you know, reporters get to ask questions.

That's just how it works.

Christina, what were your thoughts when you saw this?

I think what's hard about this is you have the governor's office clearly using taxpayer money inappropriately.

But on the flip side to this, we don't have an attorney general's office or a legislative body that's willing to hold that office accountable.

The Attorney General's office should be a watchdog for this.

But our current attorney general was appointed by Ron DeSantis and is from his administration.

And so we're looking at, well, who is watching the governor's office, who is watching the legislature, and they're not policing themselves.

And so we're relying on public media to be the watchdogs here and hold them accountable.

How did you feel when you saw that story develop, Rebecca.

That as a as a reporter who's doing your own work.

It's really unusual, isn't it?

It's unusual.

And as much waves as this story has made in political and media circles, I don't really think the hope Florida story has trickled down as much to the general public.

People are not paying as close attention as you and I might be.

But when governor DeSantis administration does something like this, I think that's the type of action that does actually get through to the average person.

So while this might have been an attempt to quash any negative press, I think it may have actually had the opposite effect.

Mike, it does create some difficulty for the, the the governor's office.

It does.

You know, I learned as a politician many, many years ago, especially as an elected official.

Transparency is key.

When a reporter asks a question, if you don't have the answer, try and get that, that, that, that that answer for them.

Um, but I agree with you, in fact, that, uh, this may be a big story, especially in Tallahassee.

Look, we had a Republican chairperson, chairman who investigated it fully.

And now what transpires after that?

Who knows?

Nothing more had been done.

But again, um, trickling down to the the average citizen, I don't think they're paying much attention to this.

And Representative Andrade, who led the subcommittee investigating this when he stopped.

Republican, in fact.

A Republican, when he stopped, he did say that he was leaving the inquiry to others.

Right, and in fact, if I'm not mistaken, the others are those in law enforcement.

And I believe that the state attorney up in that area has opened up an investigation if I'm if I'm not mistaken.

So they are looking into it.

But I truly don't believe that the governor and his wife were maybe aware of what may be transpired in all of this, I truly don't.

I think he had he he had much more important issues at hand.

Um, so who knows.

We'll see what happens when the investigation is final.

We will certainly continue to look at this.

The second story that we are following demonstrations focused on the recent immigration enforcement tactics are growing in Tampa Bay as well as across the nation.

Calls to end nationwide raids by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement are growing across many Tampa Bay counties into this weekend.

On Monday, protesters against recent Ice actions chanted and held signs outside of Tampa City Hall.

It's really bad and I hope they can stop doing the, um, separating families and everything.

But not all the people they cross, like, illegal.

Uh, they're bad people.

Some like we honest, we, uh, good workers.

A smaller group of demonstrators stood across the street in favor of actions deporting undocumented immigrants.

I just want people to come to this country the right way.

We love immigrants.

MAGA loves immigrants.

We just want legal immigrants only.

Both gatherings remain peaceful for the most part, unlike the scene unfolding in Los Angeles, thousands of protesters confronting Ice deportation teams there were met with law enforcement in riot gear and bolstered by federal troops.

President Trump, calling up the California National Guard and some 700 Marines on the grounds of law and order.

Without the support of Governor Gavin Newsom, who has sued the administration in response.

This is all happening ahead of a nationwide demonstration set for this weekend, dubbed No Kings Day.

It's described as a national day of protest against government overreach and current immigration enforcement policies.

You can see on this map more than a dozen demonstrations are scheduled in many Tampa Bay counties starting June 14th.

No Kings Day coincides with President Trump's birthday.

And, Mike, this is certainly a story that so many folks are watching and very concerned about.

What are your thoughts on this?

Well, one of the things we need to realize is that, and I'm sure we all do that.

That's how Donald Trump got elected.

I think that was his number one priority as far as talking to the public and the people who voted for him.

I believe in protesting, but very, you know, hey, let's keep it, keep it, you know, the way it should be done.

What's happening in Los Angeles is outrageous.

Uh, you know, spitting on law enforcement officers, throwing rocks at law enforcement officers.

I mean, that's unacceptable.

Breaking in and and breaking windows into stores and robbing those stores while they're closed at night, um, is just unacceptable.

And that's the wrong message that the protesters are sending to the rest of the country.

And when someone sees that the average citizen, I don't care if it's in Florida or New York or Wisconsin, they're looking at this and saying, this is wrong.

And there are certainly demonstrators who are out there participating in these events that are not.

And not.

Taking illegal legal action, right?

But what do you see on TV and what's being reported?

And what is the Trump administration telling you and showing you on TV and in their in their press releases?

And when when the president speaks, he's talking about these people who are doing exactly that spitting and law enforcement officers throwing rocks at them, breaking into stores.

When when people see that they don't they're they're they're not going to be in agreement with those protesters.

Um, here in Tampa.

Listen, you have the first the First Amendment.

You have the right to protest, to speak out.

Don't block roads, don't block where people can get in and out.

Don't block a major highways.

That turns people off.

There are passions on both sides of the issue.

Christina.

Your thoughts?

I think we have to remember why these people are protesting.

Um, as a mayor, as an American, we believe in basic human rights.

We believe in due process.

If you're on American soil, you have a right to due process.

And so if the federal government wants to deport people, there's a legal way to do that.

And they also need to follow the law.

But what happens with these protests is that they do come out peacefully, peacefully to protest and and lift up their messaging, but then it also gets infiltrated by people who want to do bad things within the community.

And so if the federal government decides that the right path is to deport people, they're going to have to do it legally, and we're going to have to find a way to lift our voices up and kind of highlight some injustices that are happening here.

What are some of the different voices that you all have, um, have been hearing from when you go out into the community with regards to this issue?

Um, when you specifically your beat is politics.

So I'd like to ask you, Kirby.

I think there's a lot of people who are upset at the way these raids are being conducted, both because they're now moving into workplaces.

Like in Tallahassee.

There was a more than 100 people got got arrested for allegedly being undocumented at a construction site.

The Ice raids or the protests in Los Angeles, rather started over Ice raids of, I believe, a Home Depot.

Parking lot of Home Depot.

And so I think it's partly how it's being done.

Also, the Ice raids are not being very forthcoming with their own documentation of where they're coming from, what their names are, who's assigning them to do that, what the warrants are.

There's there's not a it's not a very transparent operation.

Not that it necessarily has to be until we get to the court phase.

But I think there's a really interesting dynamic here overall, which is there's a lot of back and forth about whether the tactics being used in Los Angeles are justified.

Trump sending in the troops, Trump sending in the National Guard.

Is that necessary?

And if you look at polling I read today, um, if you aren't paying that much attention to the news coverage, you support what Trump is doing in Los Angeles by 19 points.

If you're paying a lot of attention, you don't support it by 19 points.

So it's sort of up to how much you're willing to look into, you know, whether you think Trump, whether you think troops should be on the streets of a major American city.

I do want to respond to something that was said earlier about the protests.

I think it's interesting that the protests in the scene that we're seeing in LA, that's what's getting people across the country out to start their own protests.

It wasn't the deportations themselves.

As you mentioned before, there were worksite raids happening here in Florida.

And when that happened, no one acted.

It was the outrageous images that people were seeing from the West Coast that was getting them to come out and start voicing their opinions here.

But I think that all sort of plays in Trump's favor, like he wants the chaos he wants.

There's no question about that.

You know, it's no, it's no, it's no problem if there's a lot of protests all over the country, because that means there may be more opportunities for recriminations on both sides.

Right.

And to be fair, there was a protest in Tallahassee in the wake of the 100 person deportation that I mentioned.

It's just that it was entirely peaceful.

And I don't think Trump's going to send in the troops to Florida any time soon.

No, it's only going to be a blue state that he sends the troops in.

I don't agree with the with the president, what he's doing as far as sending the troops in.

That's not what their job is.

We have local law enforcement officers that do a wonderful job.

The men and women, they're trained to do this and let them do their job, let the mayor do their job, their job, let the governor do their job.

I don't know what happened to Republicans at times, but I'm still a states right person.

And when we see the federal government coming in, we've got some issues.

Well, we're going to turn now to something that's a lot more positive that a lot more people agree on.

And that's something good that's happening in the realm of transportation for our community.

We're turning to transportation and the return of service, a service that many Tampa Bay residents like.

We're talking about the cross Bay ferry.

It will once again run routes between downtown Tampa and St. Petersburg.

The Cross-Bay ferry is set to return to service between Tampa and St. Petersburg.

A new agreement will transfer $4.8 million in federal grant funds from Hillsborough County to Pinellas County.

The money will help Pinellas County Transit Authority buy two new high speed ferries rather than lease boats.

A previous lease deal soured and ended the ferry service earlier this year.

This also means that the ferry will be a permanent regional transit option instead of seasonal.

Officials say faster ferry service could resume as early as 2026, once again connecting downtown Tampa to downtown St. Pete.

Rebecca, as a transportation reporter, this isn't a surprise to you.

To a lot of us, it was.

Tell us about the story.

I think this is really exciting news.

It wasn't too long ago that we thought we were going to have no ferry.

Now we're going to have an even better ferry.

And hopefully this will be a way to connect our downtowns of St. Pete and Tampa, um, make it seem like there's not as much of a divide between the two and get us towards some more regional thinking.

There were some problems with the ferry operator before.

The previous operator, I think, had floated the idea of having a smaller ship, which would have led to slower service, and I don't think either county was happy with that.

So now that they have this grant money, it will lead to even better service.

Christina your reaction?

So I'm thrilled to hear this.

I live in downtown St. Petersburg, and I use the ferry frequently as long along with my family.

And I really think this speaks to bold leadership in both Pinellas and Hillsborough, that they were able to find a solution to this.

Sometimes we're seeing that we're just building more lanes, but we need to be thinking out of the box when it comes to transportation and moving people around Tampa Bay and all over Florida as growth is booming.

And I think this really speaks to leaders who have bold visions, who are able to fix some of these problems.

And so I'm excited to see that we've come to a compromise, and I'd like to see more of it in Florida.

And speaking of bold leaders, there was an editorial that was published by the Tampa Bay Times that was written by the Tampa Bay Chamber's president, uh, Dr. Bob Rohrlack, and also by Chris Steinocher, who's the president of the Greater St. Petersburg Chamber of Commerce, coming together saying why the community should support this.

That was really a wonderful, wonderful to see them coming together and uniting the community that way.

Yeah, this has been a big thing for for the chamber.

And this wasn't a sure thing that we would have this grant money transferred over because the federal the federal government gave Hillsborough the money.

Initially it was like 4 million bucks, I think, but Hillsborough didn't want it.

And so the question was, would Hillsborough give the money to Pinellas or would they just give it back?

And it's a big win for a regional collaboration that they said, Pinellas, we trust you to spend the money wisely.

I've also taken the ferry multiple times and I just want to throw in a plug you can get from downtown St. Pete to Ybor on just public transit if you.

Well, it's not, I guess the ferry, you pay for it, but you get on the ferry, you get to downtown, you take the streetcar and you're all the way in Ybor, and you can have a great day with your friends.

And I've done that before.

Mike.

Well, I've learned as a politician never give money back to the federal government, right?

I think what Hillsborough and Pinellas are doing is outstanding.

And I wish, I hope and pray that we'll see more together doing things together like that.

So before we go, in the time that we have left, I want to ask each of you, what are the other big stories of the week that you think we should be tracking and following?

Christina, I'd love to start with you, please.

I'm really watching the Florida Legislature as they wrap up session on the ground.

People would really like to see property insurance, uh, being discussed.

Affordability, um, making our cities more resilient to the upcoming hurricane session.

And so watching the legislature to see what they finalize here in the next couple of weeks, and if they're able to address some of the issues that we're seeing within some of our communities.

Mike.

Um, there's a scam going on.

Uh, many people are getting something text to them from they claim to be the Florida Department of Highway Safety and Motor Vehicle that if you that you owe toll violations that, uh, maybe, uh, some money is owed to you.

Ignore those scams.

We've had many senior citizens and others come to our tax collector offices in Pasco concerned that their license is going to be suspended.

Their auto registration is going to be canceled.

Ignore texts that you're getting from these losers.

I call them losers.

Um, these are people who are trying to get take advantage of you and get money out of you.

Please ignore those scams.

And this is not something that's unique to Pasco County.

This is something that.

Statewide.

Residents are experiencing statewide.

We were talking earlier, I get one or two each week.

Um, and we've had people literally come into our office scared to death that their driver's license is going to be suspended.

If you're going to get something from the Department of Highway Safety motor vehicle or from the Tax Collector's office, we're going to mail you something.

We're not going to text you.

And they have links that if you click on the links, what do you all fear will happen.

That I don't know.

[laughter] Do not click.

Do not click on that link.

As I always tell.

People, the Better Business Bureau has told us that when you click on any link, depending depending whether it's an email or a text, that you're you're really putting your mobile device at risk and passwords and things like that can be taken off of that.

I agree, I would just ask people, if you get a text, ignore it, please ignore it.

Rebecca, what is the big story of the week for you?

Um, my big story is about Silver Airways ceasing operations.

The company declared bankruptcy, I think, at the end of last year, and now they're no longer going to be flying.

They did stops between Tallahassee.

They had Key West, Tampa, Orlando, I think even the Bahamas.

And it was just a really convenient budget option for people.

I'm sad to see it go.

Um, but yeah, if you had a flight on Silver Airways, you no longer do.

And it is it is unusual to have an airline just disappear.

Typically they merge.

They merge with another carrier.

And so they.

You do have something of of the airline left.

But this case is completely different.

I think they had a hard time finding a buyer in the bankruptcy sale.

Um, and it was really unexpected.

I mean, this kind of came out of nowhere, and now they're even telling people, if you need a refund, you're going to have to go through your travel insurance or your credit card, even, like, don't come to us, don't go to the airport.

This reference is going to scan with like three people.

But in an episode of 30 Rock, this literally happens.

Somebody shows up at the airport and they say, oh my, oh no, my flight was canceled.

And the person says, no, the airline was canceled.

And so literally the airline got canceled on people.

Kirby, what is the big story that you think we should be watching?

Well, back to bummers.

Um, like earlier this year, the Florida legislature passed a bill that made it illegal to be undocumented in the state of Florida.

So it's already a civil offense federally to be in the country illegally.

But now it's also a state offense.

And this is a big deal, because this is pretense that state law enforcement are using to arrest undocumented immigrants.

But there's a catch.

A federal judge temporarily said this law can't go into effect while we figure out whether it's constitutional, because there's long been a push and pull over the states and the federal government over whether the states should get to enforce immigration laws.

The thinking being that they're not allowed to.

Because if you have 50 different states, 50 different immigration laws, that's a problem.

So Florida has this law that says you can't be illegal, undocumented, be in the state.

A judge said that law has to be put on hold.

But even after the judge put the law on hold, our reporters found out the state still arrested more than two dozen people for being in the country illegally.

And more than a dozen of those people were put into Ice detention and some were deported.

And so there's sort of an open flouting of this order from the from the courts to to suspend this law temporarily.

Now that law is still making its way through the courts, it may be decided that it's that it's okay at the end of the day.

But I just thought it was really great reporting by our reporters, Hannah Critchfield and Ashley Borgia.

So if you want to check out that story on tampabay.com, it's a good one.

And the Florida State Attorney has, was had reached out very forcefully to law enforcement and say you must enforce this.

Yeah, he was kind of a novel legal argument, he said, because the judge did not name law enforcement in their order suspending the law.

You guys can go forth and do what you were going to do.

But, um, that's the judge then came back and said, no, no, I want to make it very clear, um, nobody can be enforcing this law while we figure out whether it's allowed.

Um, so yeah, the legal fight is still going on, but it doesn't matter for the real people that were caught up in in the crosshairs.

Thank you so much, all of you, for coming in and contributing your thoughts.

It's always wonderful to have you.

We certainly hope you'll come back.

Thank you again.

That is our panel.

Thanks to our panel members, Kirby Wilson, Christina Diamond, Rebecca Leibson, and Mike Fasano.

Send your comments about this program to ftw@wedu.

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Have a great weekend!

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