Two Democratic congressional candidates in Florida have been targeted by fraudulent texts invoking their sexual orientation and falsely claiming ties to the state’s largest LGBTQ organization ahead of the August 18 primary.
“I don’t know if we’ve seen something like this before,” Brandon Wolf, Equality Florida’s senior director of communications strategy, told Metro Weekly. “We certainly have never had a smear campaign falsely attributed to us as an organization.”
Sent to South Florida voters from at least two Florida phone numbers, the messages have targeted State Sen. Shevrin Jones, whom most polls show leading the 24th Congressional District race, and Kendrick Meek, Jr., an attorney and former federal employee whose father and grandmother represented predecessor districts. Both men are gay.
The first text to surface, first reported by the political news website Florida Politics, targeted Jones and falsely claimed that he had been turned away from donating blood to a COVID survivor “after testing positive for HIV/AIDS because of his homosexuality.”
“This is not right[.] stand with our gay community,” reads the text, which was falsely attributed to Equality Florida.
The message links to an August 2020 report from West Palm Beach CBS affiliate WPEC about Jones being turned away from donating convalescent plasma at a Pembroke Park blood drive because he was gay. The story makes no mention of HIV.
Jones, then a state representative who had recovered from COVID, was denied the opportunity to donate plasma under a now-defunct U.S. Food and Drug Administration policy restricting donations from men who have sex with men. The FDA has since replaced that policy with risk-based screening for all donors.
A second text sent to South Florida voters took a different tack, ostensibly celebrating Jones’ and Meek’s identities.
“Two openly gay men are the frontrunners to replace Frederica Wilson in Congress,” the text reads. “Shevrin Jones and Kendrick Meek, both openly gay, are battling to replace Wilson in Congress. We have come such a long way. Get out and support one of our openly gay Candidates.”
The message claims to be from “Equity Florida,” which some have speculated was intended to suggest an affiliation with Equality Florida, the statewide LGBTQ advocacy organization. According to the Florida Division of Corporations, no entity called “Equity Florida” has been active in the state since 1965.
Wolf says Equality Florida — which has endorsed Jones for Congress — is investigating who sent the texts, why they invoked the organization’s name, and what the sender hoped to accomplish.
“We don’t know [who sent it] yet,” Wolf told Metro Weekly. “We’re doing our due diligence to dig into who may be responsible following whatever money trail we can find.”
One of the numbers used to send the texts has no publicly identifiable owner, while another appears to be associated with an individual in Palm Beach Gardens.
A Google search for that person’s name surfaced an X account that frequently references God and links to another account containing numerous posts praising President Donald Trump. The latter account has not been updated since 2020. The online trail does not establish who controlled the phone number at the time the texts were sent or who was responsible for the messages.
Federal law bars candidates and their agents from fraudulently claiming to represent another candidate or political party in a damaging matter. Political advertisements must also disclose who paid for them and whether they were authorized by a candidate. Violations can result in civil penalties from the Federal Election Commission, while deliberate violations may be criminally prosecuted.
“This text message went out to voters across Congressional District 24, many of whom are Black,” Wolf said. “So someone has a list of voters that they were able to target and text. And that means there’s money behind this effort.”
Wolf says Jones has received broad support from colleagues in the Florida Legislature, several of whom have defended him or shared photos and memories of working with him on social media.
“Over the next week, I think you’re going to see a lot of people rallying for Shev, and for each other and for the community,” Wolf says. “This attack is not just homophobic, it’s not just illegal, it’s also clearly powered by anonymous dark money. And the question before voters is going to be: ‘Who has the power when it comes to our elections?’ Voters have an opportunity to send Shev to Congress to make history, making him Florida’s first openly LGBTQ member of Congress, and send a clear and resounding rejection of anonymous dark money that tries to pit us against each other.”
Jones’ campaign manager, Kai Garel, responded in a statement to Metro Weekly..
“With just one week until the primary, [Senator Jones] will not be distracted by false, fraudulent attacks meant to deceive and confuse voters,” Garel said. “Shevrin Jones for Congress strongly condemns these attacks and calls on supporters, surrogates, and endorsers of all of the other candidates in the race for Congress in District 24 to condemn these desperate text messages as well.”
Miami-Dade County Commissioner Oliver Gilbert, whom polling shows as Jones’ closest competitor, denounced the attack in a statement.
“I will not repeat it. It’s a lie. It’s evil, hurtful, and it needs to stop,” Gilbert said. “Shev is my friend. He was my friend before this election and he’ll be my friend after the election. Stop this hateful, homophobic, and vile rhetoric.”
A Meek campaign spokesperson said the campaign does not know who sent the messages and learned of them from supporters. The spokesperson referred Metro Weekly to a statement Meek posted on social media.
“I strongly condemn the fraudulent, homophobic smear campaign targeting Shevrin Jones. Spreading false claims and forging an Equality Florida disclaimer is a fraud on our voters,” Meek said. “We must stand united against bigotry and hate in all forms. As a fellow member of the LGBTQ community, I have reached out to Shev to express my shared disgust and commitment to a clean race. South Florida deserves better.”
Two men were beaten and subjected to anti-gay slurs in what police believe was a bias-motivated attack in downtown Manhattan last month.
The victims, ages 31 and 37, were walking on Broadway near West 29th Street around 7:30 p.m. on July 31 when two men approached them and made anti-LGBTQ remarks, according to the New York Daily News.
The assailants then repeatedly punched and kicked the victims while shouting homophobic slurs, according to police. The suspects fled south on Broadway.
A West Miami man is facing three felony charges for allegedly pulling a gun on, choking, and beating a sexual partner who became upset after a disturbing sexual act during a hookup.
According to West Miami police, officers responded to a call about a man "crying and bleeding in the middle of the roadway" around 6 a.m. on June 28. They arrived in the 6100 block of Southwest 14th Street, where they found the victim, who told them what had happened before the assault, as reported by independent Miami-area TV station WPLG.
Last week, Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro signed an anti-human trafficking bill into law that contains provisions repealing parts of an existing state law that allowed people with HIV to be charged with enhanced criminal penalties if they engaged in prostitution and did not disclose their status to clients.
Previously, people living with HIV could face harsher penalties than people without HIV for engaging in the same illicit activity. For example, a person without HIV who was charged with prostitution would face only a misdemeanor, while a person with HIV who engaged in the same behavior could be charged with a felony.
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