Notary links ‘ghost’ candidate, consultant
One of the enduring mysteries from last year’s Florida Senate District 9 race is how Jestine Iannotti, a former substitute teacher who did no campaigning and has since moved to Sweden, wound up on Seminole and Volusia county voters’ ballots as an independent candidate.
But indications continue to emerge that Eric Foglesong, a controversial political consultant close to prominent Seminole County Republicans, played a significant role in getting her candidacy off the ground.
The latest example: A key piece of election paperwork for Iannotti was notarized at an Altamonte Springs insurance agency with direct ties to Foglesong.
Foglesong once had an office inside the building owned by The Whitehead Agency and is a friend and former neighbor of founder Mark Whitehead Jr., who told the Orlando Sentinel the firm typically does not provide public notary services.
Yet an employee of the firm stamped one of Iannotti’s financial disclosure forms on June 12, 2020, the last day of the qualifying period. The form was emailed from Iannotti’s campaign account to the Division of Elections at 11:38 a.m. on the same day.
Iannotti was one of three so-called “ghost” candidates who filed to run in competitive Senate races last year who didn’t campaign themselves but were
promoted by a dark-money funded advertising blitz in an apparent scheme to siphon votes from Democrats.
The two political committees that sent the ads, which were worded to appeal to left-leaning voters, reported receiving all of their funding, a total of $550,000, from a dark-money non-profit organization. All three races were won by Republicans, helping the party retain control of the 40-member Florida Senate.
A Florida Department of Law Enforcement spokesperson said last month the agency was starting a “preliminary investigation” into the District 9 race, though she would not say which specific allegations were under investigation.
Foglesong was one of four donors to Iannotti’s campaign, contributing $300. He also likely wrote the check that paid Iannotti’s filing fees, three handwriting experts told the Orlando Sentinel in May.
He didn’t respond to requests for comment about the notarization of Iannotti’s financial disclosure and has declined in the past to discuss details of his work with Iannotti, though he has said that he has “a track record of supporting people, not parties.”
Whitehead said he didn’t know how his employee came to notarize Iannotti’s form.
“I did not notarize the document in question, I was not even in the office when it occurred and have no knowledge of Ms. Iannotti, except what I have heard through news sources,” Whitehead wrote. “I wouldn’t know her if she passed me on a sidewalk.”
Whitehead and Foglesong are friends on social media and lived on the same block in Maitland as recently as 2014. Foglesong also had an office in the 3,700-squarefoot two-story Ballard Street building owned by The Whitehead Agency.
Foglesong once brought two women he’d met at a strip club and steakhouse in Casselberry back to that office “for a show,” according to an Altamonte Springs Police Department report filed in May 2018, after Foglesong accused one of the women of attempting to extort him.
Whitehead said he didn’t employ Foglesong or know anything about his business.
“I could not hear, nor did I participate in anything he was working on,” Whitehead said. “I think he is the one that you should approach to get the additional details you are seeking.”
The name of another notary appears on Iannotti’s other required campaign forms. According to the notary’s LinkedIn profile, he works for Bank of America, which does provide public notarization services.
Iannotti, a former substitute teacher for the Seminole County school district, was a political newcomer when she filed to run last year to represent Florida Senate District 9, which includes all of Seminole and part of Volusia. After qualifying for the highly competitive race, she spent several weeks in Sweden and refused to speak to reporters.
Yet Republican strategists in Tallahassee featured Iannotti last fall in a series of mailers that appeared designed to appeal to Democratic-leaning voters. Tens of thousands of mailers touting Iannotti as a candidate who would “find solutions on issues that matter” like health care and climate change were sent to Seminole and Volusia homes.
Republican Jason Brodeur of Sanford won the race, defeating Democrat Patricia Sigman by 7,644 votes, while Iannotti received more than 5,000 votes.
Iannotti moved to Sweden earlier this year and has not responded to phone calls and emails from the Sentinel since then.
The then-Republican consultant who ran the committee that sent the ads championing Iannotti ran a second committee that sent similar mailers touting independent candidates in two Miami-area Senate races, which were also won by Republicans.
Former state Senator Frank Artiles was later accused of paying one of the South Florida candidates, Alex Rodriguez of Boca Raton, nearly $45,000 as a bribe to file to run. Artiles and Rodriguez were charged with violating state campaign finance laws. Rodriguez pleaded guilty last month and agreed to cooperate in the state’s case against Artiles.
Records obtained by investigators show Artiles also helped the other independent candidate in South Florida get on the ballot, though no one has been charged in connection with that race.
There’s no evidence that Artiles played a role in Iannotti’s campaign, though Artiles was reportedly in Seminole County on Election Night celebrating at Brodeur’s victory party.