As the race for Florida’s Congressional District 13 shapes up, the National Republican Congressional Committee has launched some familiar attacks against Democratic candidate and former state CFO Alex Sink.
PolitiFact Florida examined a Jan. 15 web ad against Sink that raises charges about Sink’s 2010 loss to then-candidate Gov. Rick Scott.
The latest ads revive the claim that Sink used state airplanes for a trip to the Bahamas.
“She used a taxpayer-funded plane so she could get to a vacation in the Bahamas,” the video says, listing a number of flight-related claims.
The accusations became difficult for Sink during her 2010 campaign, and the new claims want to cause her more turbulence.
A 2009 report (reported in both the Tampa Bay Times and Miami Herald) show the Sink’s state-provided air travel cost $413,334 between January 2007 and June 2009.
Florida law requires Cabinet members to maintain residence in Tallahassee, but does not let them to use state planes to travel to other residences.
The NRCC’s ad refers to a Florida Commission on Ethics investigation, claiming a trip to the Bahamas and spending $400,000 of “taxpayer money to fly around the state” and “used the plane to attend political campaign events.”
The commission found no wrongdoing by Sink, and that she violated no state statutes.
In addition, the ethics panel found no “willful intent,” and that she also met the reimbursement guidelines for attending campaign events and transporting family. Sink’s use of state planes did not constitute a misuse of state resources.
It is against Florida rules to use state aircraft to shuttle between a lawmaker’s home and Tallahassee, the Times notes, but they do allow flying an official to state functions and back. Sink had flown on state planes 58 of nearly 250 times either to or from Tampa International or Vandenberg airport (later changed in 2009 to Tampa Executive Airport).
She paid for almost 190 commercial flights home during the time period under examination.
During the investigation, Sink claim she flew to one city for an official function, and it was a “common practice” to stop at a high-ranking officer’s home or other destination, for picking them up or dropping off. Diverted flights are acceptable if there was business in the destination city for pickup flights, or in originating cities for drop-off flights.
Manager Mike McClure of the Department of Management Services Bureau of Executive Aircraft Operations told the board the costs in diverting flights this way were minimal.
As for the NRCC accusation of a taxpayer-sponsored trip to the Bahama, Sink has diverted a plane (legitimately) in 2008 to Fort Lauderdale to catch a Continental flight to the Bahamas, where she and her husband Bill McBride had a condominium.
The ad is worded to make it seem Sink took a plane all the way to the Bahamas, which would have been appropriate only if she had legitimate business.
The December 2009 committee report found “no probable cause” for claiming Sink violated state laws. Inconsistencies in Florida statues also led to confusion over using state planes, with some officials using them for trips without a valid business purpose. The committee recommended clarifying the law, since the law as it stood could not definitively find any wrongdoing.
In ruling the ad “Half True,” PolitiFact took exception with the NRCC claim that Sink “used a taxpayer-funded plane so she could get to a vacation in the Bahamas.”
It is true Sink was headed to a vacation in the Bahamas, and it is true that she used a state plane to reach her commercial flight after finishing her official business in Miami.
The ad obscures the fact an ethics committee cleared Sink of any state law violations, and aircraft diversions were commonplace for high-ranking officials at the time.
The flight, which only took her 25 miles out of the way, can be interpreted as using the plane to “get to a vacation in the Bahamas.” But the phrasing suggests Sink took a state plane to the Bahamas, which she did not.
