While Scandal Simmers, Republicans in Florida want the party chairman out

The transgression Florida Republicans most wanted to discuss at the State Capitol this week was Florida State University’s snub from the College Football Playoff. Not many people wanted to say anything — at least publicly — about the investigation into their state party chairman for sexual assault.

But privately, the fate of the chairman, Christian Ziegler, was the talk of Tallahassee.

“This is the topic of every water cooler conversation and every lunchroom conversation,” said State Rep. Spencer Roach, a Republican from North Fort Myers. “People are confused, bewildered and frustrated.”

It wasn’t just that Mr. Ziegler, who has not been charged, is under criminal investigation. It was also his refusal to resign after the accusation against him came to light last week.

Not even after the public learned from a search warrant affidavit that he and his wife, a conservative activist who fights for anti-LGBTQ policies in schools, confirmed to police that they had once had a consensual sexual encounter with Mr. Ziegler’s accuser.

Not even after Governor Ron DeSantis, the party’s titular head and candidate for president, twice said Mr. Ziegler should resign.

Annoyed, other Republican leaders tried to put pressure on him. The Senate President and the Speaker of the State House each called for his resignation. So did Sen. Rick Scott and all three elected members of Florida’s Cabinet. The party’s vice chairman called for a special meeting of the board of directors to consider disciplining, censuring or ultimately deposing Mr. Ziegler.

Yet Mr. Ziegler has not relented.

Perhaps the awkward standoff reflected a natural tension between the party chairman, a behind-the-scenes role and elected officials who are more publicly visible. Or perhaps it was a sign of Mr. DeSantis’ diminished power, given his struggling presidential campaign. Perhaps Mr. Ziegler was counting on low-level outrage for a sex scandal.

Be that as it may, a week of committee meetings focused on the upcoming legislative session took place against a backdrop of speculation about the future, not only from Mr. Ziegler and his wife, Bridget Ziegler, but also from the Republican Party apparatus in a politically influential state. entering a presidential election year.

“The mission must come first,” Mr. DeSantis said Tuesday when asked about Mr. Ziegler after unveiling his budget proposal. “It doesn’t help the mission to have this hanging over his head.”

Mr. Ziegler, 40, did not respond to voice or text messages seeking comment on Wednesday.

The longer Ziegler tries to stay in post, the longer it will take for the party to choose a new leader ahead of Florida’s presidential election in March and the general election in November. The role of state chairman is not as powerful as it once was – a corruption scandal more than a decade ago landed a former chairman in jail – but it remains important to the party’s fundraising and cheerleading.

“Every day that Christian Ziegler remains chairman, he sends a chilling message to the women of Florida about how the Republican Party views sexual violence,” said State Rep. Fentrice Driskell, Democrat of Tampa and House Minority Leader.

Whatever happens, Republicans will almost certainly maintain clear advantages in the state in voter registration, candidate recruitment and seats in state legislatures and Congress, while Democrats try to rebuild their country after years of electoral losses. Still, the Republican brand in Florida could suffer from the Ziegler scandal.

“These people have for years considered themselves paragons of Christian conservative values,” Mr. Roach said, referring to Mr. Ziegler and his wife. “This is a huge breach of trust.”

Mr. Ziegler, through his lawyer, has denied wrongdoing. He told police he had consensual sex with the woman who accused him on Oct. 2, according to a search warrant affidavit. Her name has been redacted from public records.

The woman told police that she had a sexual encounter with Mr. Ziegler and Mrs. Ziegler more than a year ago, but that on October 2 she refused to have sex with Mr. Ziegler after realizing that his wife was not coming with them would go. .

Mr. Ziegler then went to her apartment uninvited and sexually assaulted her, the woman told police.

Mr. Ziegler told police he filmed the encounter, although investigators have been unable to locate the video. According to the affidavit, they obtained search warrants for Mr.’s cell phone. Ziegler and his Google account.

Ms. Ziegler confirmed to police that she had participated in the earlier sexual encounter with the woman, a fact that Democrats and Republicans like Mr. Roach have seized on as evidence of hypocrisy given Ms. Ziegler’s public anti-LGBTQ rhetoric.

Mrs. Ziegler, 41, has not responded to repeated requests for comment since the investigation into her husband came to light last week. She is an elected member of the Sarasota County School Board and a prominent supporter of an education parental rights law that critics nicknamed “Don’t Say Gay.” The law prohibits classroom instruction on LGBTQ topics; Ms. Ziegler stood behind Mr. DeSantis when he signed the bill into law in 2022.

She also co-founded the right-wing activist group Moms for Liberty, though she is no longer an official of the national organization, which noted Tuesday that she resigned “almost three years ago.” Moms for Liberty and Ms. Ziegler campaigned for Mr. DeSantis’ re-election last year; the governor has since appointed her to a state board that oversees Disney World.

The Zieglers have regularly posted on social media against transgender rights in particular. Mrs. Ziegler defended a post from April in which she wore a T-shirt that read “Real women are not men.”

Tom Edwards, a member of the Sarasota school board and openly gay, said in an interview that Ms. Ziegler should resign from the board. The Zieglers, he argued, “used the culture wars for their personal gain and for their advancement within the party — all the while at the expense of the children.”

“When you’re a young person discovering your identity, your orientation, and you have ‘Don’t Say Gay,’ and we have to remove gay characters, and we can’t talk about gay families, then your self-esteem is damaged,” Mr. Edwards said, a democrat.

The Zieglers have been influential in Sarasota County, an affluent part of the state’s Gulf Coast that has emerged as a center of right-wing activism in recent years. The area is home to Michael T. Flynn, former President Donald J. Trump’s first national security adviser, who has embraced the pro-Trump conspiracy theory Q-Anon. Rumble, the right-wing video platform, is headquartered in the area.

Mr. Ziegler is a former Sarasota County commissioner who was an early supporter of Mr. Trump. When he was elected chairman of the state party in February, he was seen as a supporter of Mr. Trump, not Mr. DeSantis — which could be a factor in why he has not heeded the call from the governor to resign.

Mr. Trump has not spoken out.

Kitty Bennett research contributed.