A Florida mayor was removed from office Friday after she was arrested and charged with three felony corruption charges.
Gov. Rick Scott issued an executive order suspending Joy Cooper, the 57-year-old mayor of Hallandale Beach, a city just north of Miami, after she was accused of accepting illegal campaign contributions through former attorney Alan Koslow.
Cooper surrender to authorities on Thursday following an undercover FBI investigation. She was charged with money laundering, official misconduct and exceeding campaign contribution limits, the Sun Sentinel reported.
Court documents show that Koslow was given a Dunkin’ Donuts bag filled with $8,000 in cash by undercover agents August 2012. He allegedly told undercover agents he had influence with the city commission and “had the vote of the mayor.”
Agents reportedly met with Cooper and Koslow several times in 2012 and secretly recorded the meetings. In one such meeting, Cooper was recorded saying she and two other commissioners were a “team of three” and could ensure a favorable result for their project, the newspaper reported.
Additionally, Cooper also allegedly solicited fund for Anthony Sanders, the former commissioner of Hallandale Beach, who resigned from his position August 2017 following allegations of miscounted. The Sun Sentinel reported Sanders was accused of voting to award nearly $1 million to a nonprofit that made monthly payments to his church and family.
In addition to the felony charges, Cooper was also charged with soliciting contributions in a government building, a first-degree misdemeanor with a one-year maximum sentence.
The felony charges carry maximum prison sentences of five years.
Larry Davis, her attorney, said she plans to plead not guilty.
Cooper, a Democrat, has been the city’s mayor since 2005 and previously served on the city commission beginning in 1999.
“I can assure you that I will vigorously fight these allegations in court,” Cooper said in a prepared statement obtained by the Sun Sentinel.
The news outlet reported Cooper emptied her office before turning herself into Main Jail in Fort Lauderdale on Thursday. She was released later that night.
Eric Fordin, a developer, told the Sun Sentinel he was “shocked” by the allegations against Cooper.
“(She) has always been so aboveboard. I recall her writing a check for $2.45 for a soda at the grand opening of one of our hotels because she could not accept a drink,” Fordin said.
Fordin said he was never asked or pressured by the mayor or other Hallandale Beach politicians for contributions.
Vice Mayor Keith London will take over Cooper’s duties while she is suspended.
The Democrat who took to the House floor to call for President Trump's impeachment said he is moving forward in the process.
Congressman Al Green (D-Texas) said on C-SPAN that every member of Congress has the right to draft articles of impeachment.
He said such documents must be heard during official House business within two days.
"I am currently crafting - drafting if you will - articles of impeachment," Green said.
Green said Trump committed obstruction of justice by firing FBI Director James Comey in the midst of the Russia investigation.
He added that Trump further incriminated himself by tweeting "intimidating language" about Comey.
"This is not about Republicans, this is about the Republic," Green said.
Two Democratic operatives just lost their job after a controversial conservative activist published an undercover video showing discussions of "busing" in voters and inciting violence at Republican rallies.
Scott Foval, the national field director of Americans United for Change, was booted on Monday and Democracy Partners head Robert Creamer announced on Tuesday he was “stepping back” from efforts to elect Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton.
“I am unwilling to become a distraction to the important task of electing [Hillary] Clinton, and defeating Donald Trump in the upcoming election,” Creamer said in a statement.
The Democratic National Committee also disown the schemes discussed in the video.
“The practices described in the video by this temporary sub-contractor do not in any way comport with our long standing policies on organizing events, and those statements and sentiments do not represent the values that the Committee holds dear,” DNC interim Chairwoman Donna Brazile said of Foval in a statement on Tuesday.
The undercover “Rigging the Election” videos, produced by controversial activist James O’Keefe, total over 32 minutes and were released in two, edited portions on Monday and Tuesday. An undercover filmmaker posing as a donor is seen attempting to engage Foval and Creamer in discussions of voter fraud and other schemes. Creamer doesn’t bite, but Foval fills the filmmaker in on supposed plots and implicates Creamer.
“It’s a very easy thing for Republicans to say, ‘Well, they’re busing people in.’ … We’ve been busing people in to deal with you f-----‘ a------- for fifty years and we’re not going to stop now, we’re just going to find a different way to do it,” says Foval, who indicates using personal vehicles for each voter arouses less suspicion than busing in a large number of people from out of state at once.
Foval also discusses planting people at rallies for Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump. Those chosen are sent to incite violence and are even given scripts and training, according to Foval.
“I mean honestly, it is not hard to get some of these a------- to pop off,” Foval says. “It’s a matter of showing up, to want to get into the rally, in a Planned Parenthood t-shirt. Or, Trump is a Nazi, you know? You can message to draw them out, and draw them to punch you.”
Foval worked as a sub-contractor for Creamer’s group, which was contracted with the DNC since June 2016. A DNC source stressed that Foval was not a DNC employee.
Hillary Clinton campaign spokesman Zac Petkanas said, "While Project Veritas has been known to offer misleading video out of context, some of the language and tactics referenced in the video are troubling even as a theory or proposal never executed."
As reported on "The Kelly File," Creamer also is shown on video being asked about circumventing voter registration laws for Hispanics, though he later said in a statement that none of the schemes described in the conversation on video ever took place.
O’Keefe has previously come under fire for heavily editing and manipulating his recordings. His tactics have also been questioned. O’Keefe was arrested while trying to gain access to Sen. Mary Landrieu’s office in Louisiana in 2010. He was later charged with a misdemeanor and sentenced to three years’ probation.
“The discredited source of these videos, James O’Keefe, is a convicted criminal with a history of doctoring video to advance his ideological agenda,” Brazile said. “We are in the process of conducting an internal investigation to determine whether he and his cohorts committed any illegal activities in this well-funded operation.”
