Sunshine News: How the Seminole Tribe gamed state GOP

Wednesday, May 5, 2010  

"The Seminole casino compact approved by the 2010 Legislature could deliver up to $1.2 billion to the state's coffers over the next five years, but the back story on the deal makes that jackpot look like an ill-gotten gain. And some say the state got hosed.

Negotiating for the state was George LeMieux, a longtime friend and adviser to Charlie Crist, who, ironically, had publicly denounced the notion of casino expansion.

Priming the pump, the Seminole Tribe started funneling some $600,000 into the Florida Republican Party in 2006 -- the year Crist was running for governor.

The tribe's Coastal Development partner began donating another $300,000, according to campaign contribution records.

LeMieux, serving as Crist's chief of staff in 2007, negotiated the first Seminole agreement giving the tribe exclusive rights to deal blackjack and other banked card games at its casinos.

Though Crist has publicly fashioned himself as a staunch supporter of the state's open-government laws, his crony's dealings with the Seminoles were all conducted behind closed doors.

When Crist refused to submit the agreement to the Legislature for ratification, the pact was summarily struck down by the Florida Supreme Court -- as courts had done in other states where governors tried to unilaterally impose similar secretly negotiated deals.

But neither Crist nor the tribe was finished yet.

In December 2007, LeMieux became chairman of the Fort Lauderdale law firm Gunster Yoakley and kept negotiating with the Seminoles on behalf of the governor.

He did so, he said at the time, without pay. But records show that the Republican Party of Florida paid $150,000 to LeMieux's consulting company, MTC Strategies (named after the senator's sons Max, Taylor and Chase)."

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