A corporate dark money group just spent millions to help Ron DeSantis

Ron DeSantis' efforts to keep marijuana illegal and abortion banned in Florida got a big boost from a group with ties to Big Sugar.

Photo credit: Kim Seng

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In mid-2018, shortly after Ron DeSantis started running for governor, the then-Congressman from Jacksonville was suddenly hit by millions of dollars in untraceable attack ads trying to stop him from winning the Republican nomination.

Technically, the advertising was paid for by a tiny Tea Party offshoot. But federal tax records, filed long after the election had ended, show that most of its cash actually came from a dark-money outfit controlled by the Florida Chamber of Commerce, the big business front group in Tallahassee.

There’s still no way to tell for sure who gave the Chamber all that money to go after DeSantis. That’s because chamber executives spent it through a nonprofit entity — called “Secure Florida’s Future” — that does not have to disclose its donors.

But DeSantis himself claimed at the time that the ads were ultimately the work of Florida’s sugar industry, which had clashed with him in Congress and was supporting his opponent in the Republican primary for governor.    

Six years later, the Florida Chamber of Commerce once again used its dark-money vehicle to dump millions of dollars into Florida elections.

But this time it spent the money helping DeSantis.

New records show that Secure Florida’s Future spent more than $7 million on last-minute campaign contributions during the final two months of this year’s campaign. It is, by far, the most money that the Florida Chamber’s dark-money group has ever spent on direct political donations, records show.

Most of the chamber’s untraceable cash — more than $4.8 million — went to a group called “Keep Florida Clean,” a political committee controlled by DeSantis’ chief of staff. It was set up to oppose Amendment 3, the ballot measure that would have legalized recreational marijuana in Florida.

Secure Florida’s Future put another $2.4 million into a collection of chamber-run political committees that then rolled most of the money into the Republican Party of Florida. The state party was, at the time, spending much of its money on ads attacking both Amendment 3 and Amendment 4 — the ballot initiative that would have ended a near-total ban on abortion in Florida.

A majority of Florida voters supported the two referendums. But both fell short of the 60 percent supermajority required to amend the state constitution.

Defeating the two petition drives was a top personal priority for DeSantis, who could try to use the conquests as a platform for another presidential run in 2028. The untraceable cash from the Florida Chamber of Commerce helped supplement an estimated $20 million or more in taxpayer money that the DeSantis administration spent on thinly disguised “public service announcements” against the marijuana and abortion ballot measures.

Now, just like in 2018, there’s no way to say for certain who gave Secure Florida’s Future all this money to spend on state elections.

But it could be Big Sugar trying to repair its relationship with Ron DeSantis.

There reason I single out the sugar industry here is that the Florida Chamber of Commerce stepped up its dark-money spending shortly after the state’s two Big Sugar companies — Florida Crystals and U.S. Sugar Corp. — began working with the DeSantis administration on plans for a massive rock mine on former Everglades land.

That proposed mine, which would be built on land largely owned by Florida Crystals and U.S. Sugar, set off alarms among Everglades activists and clean-water groups when plans first publicly emerged over the summer. They warn that the project could interfere with long-running efforts to restore Florida’s once-famed River of Grass.

The Florida Chamber’s dark-money operation isn’t the only sugar-linked entity that has just stepped up its political spending, either.  

For instance, permit and other applications submitted to DeSantis’ Department of Environmental Protection and the DeSantis-appointed South Florida Water Management District were filed by Phillips & Jordan, a large construction contractor that has worked with Florida Crystals in the past.

Records show that Phillips & Jordan has nearly tripled its campaign spending in Florida this year. The company has given more than $1.7 million to Florida Republican politicians and political groups so far in 2024 — including $100,000 directly to DeSantis on the day before the election.

There are other big sugar industry issues looming over Tallahassee, too.

Just a few months ago, Florida’s Republican-controlled Legislature ordered a state university to conduct a quick new study of Lake Okeechobee — the giant lake that was once the beating heart of the historic Everglades and has been at the center of an intense battle between the sugar industry and environmental groups.

A report on that study is due in less than two months, shortly before Florida lawmakers convene for their 2025 session. It’s possible that lawmakers may try once again to pass legislation giving Big Sugar more control over Lake Okeechobee’s water levels — an idea that DeSantis vetoed in the past.

Just to emphasize again: We don’t know whether Florida Crystals or U.S. Sugar is behind any of the money that Secure Florida’s Future spent supporting Ron DeSantis this fall. We don’t know any of the donors at all — which is, of course, the entire point of using a dark-money nonprofit in the first place.

For what it’s worth, I asked representatives for both Florida Crystals and U.S. Sugar whether they have ever given money to Secure Florida’s Future. Neither company would answer.

I also asked the Florida Chamber if it would identify any of the donors to Secure Florida’s Future. It would not.  

But Secure Florida’s Future also has more links to the sugar industry beyond funding those anti-DeSantis attacks in 2018 — the attacks that, remember, DeSantis himself said came from Big Sugar.

In 2020, for instance, tax records show that Secure Florida’s Future paid nearly $500,000 to Matrix LLC, an infamous Alabama consulting firm whose operatives helped orchestrate Florida’s 2020 “ghost candidate” scandal — amid a variety of other schemes.

The Florida Chamber has refused to say precisely what it paid Matrix to do. But Matrix had three known clients in Florida at the time: Florida Power & Light; Mosaic Co.; and Florida Crystals.

And while most of what’s known about Matrix’s activities at the time involved FPL, records show that the firm’s operatives also worked on projects for the sugar industry. Those projects included setting up fake grassroots groups that personally attacked Everglades activists and promoted Big Sugar’s position on Lake Okeechobee.

The bottom line here is that a whole lot of corporate dark money was just spent helping Ron DeSantis keep marijuana illegal and abortion banned in Florida. DeSantis was desperate to win these fights, which he viewed as crucial to his legacy as governor and his potential path forward as a presidential candidate.

And while we may not know for certain which corporations were behind the dark money that helped him, you can bet that DeSantis himself does.

So now that the elections are over, one of the most important stories to watch in Florida politics over the next few months will be if and how Florida’s governor starts to shift on issues involving corporate interests like Big Sugar.