Gov. Rick Scott’s top legal counsel has told the Florida Supreme Court that he gave the court wrong information in a key instance in a case over high speed rail.
General Counsel Charles Trippe wrote to Chief Justice Canady on Thursday to notify the court that he misrepresented what some justices appeared to think was a key fact in the argument over the governor’s rejection of federal money for high speed rail.
Trippe in his letter acknowledged that he gave inaccurate figures to the court in support of Scott’s rejection of $2.4 billion dollars Florida had been awarded for the Tampa to Orlando rail project.
Scott was sued by Sen. Thad Altman, R-Viera and Sen. Arthenia Joyner, D-Tampa, over the issue, arguing that the Legislature had made the rail a state goal through legislation–and appropriated $130 million to spend on rail, an appropriation that the governor couldn’t simply ignore.
But the Supreme Court sided against the people and with the governor.
Trippe told the justices that $110 million of the $130 million that the Florida Legislature had approved for the project in 2009, had already been spent. But he acknowledged in his letter only $31 million had been spent.
Meanwhile, Altman told the Palm Beach Post that they knew what Trippe had told the court was wrong, but they couldn’t stop him from saying it. Really?
Why wouldn’t the attorney for Altman and Joyner inform the court that Trippe was wrong? And why has it taken more than a month after the hearing for this information to be made public out?
On Friday, a spokesman for Scott said, Trippe’s error was unintentional.
Now really!
Did Trippe lie to the Supreme Court about high speed rail funding?
