(TheRedWire.com) – In the last year, Republican Florida Governor Ron DeSantis spent close to $10 million on transportation and security.
In a recently released document, the Florida Department of Law Enforcement (FDLE) revealed that $9.4 million had been spent on DeSantis and his family’s protection from July 2022 until June 2023. In the year before that, the amount spent on their protection had been $3 million lower.
DeSantis is one of the 2024 Republican presidential primary candidates, and his campaign has spent the past few months traveling around different states as part of his presidential campaign. The increase in the funds spent also indicates some of the national trips DeSantis had to take before the 2022 midterm elections to support several other Republican candidates.
FDLE officials had previously informed NBC that the presidential campaign or travel did not cause the increase in security costs. Still, instead, there were necessary additions to the security that they needed to compensate for by fixing shortcomings in the governor’s security.
Gretl Plessinger, an FDLE spokeswoman, revealed in June that the team organized by Commissioner Glass had found that almost a decade later, the FDLE had not fulfilled the additional requirements in Protective Operations despite the growing threats across the nation. She added that around $6.3 million of the $9.4 million was used for security salaries, while only $3.1 million was used for transportation. Most of the funds were also spent on DeSantis himself, while only a small amount was used to ensure his family’s security.
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