FDP Chair Terrie Rizzo on Adam Putnam's Gun Scandal Cover Up

Today, FDP Chair Terrie Rizzo released the following statement on a new Politico report showing that Adam Putnam’s Department of Agriculture’s failed to properly investigate its mismanagement of the concealed carry system:

“Adam Putnam’s office is engaged in a highly unethical, and possibly illegal, effort to cover up their mismanagement of the concealed carry system. New reporting makes clear that Putnam deceived the people of Florida when he said he conducted a full investigation into the gun scandal. Instead, Putnam led a sham probe into his own department and then tried to hide it from the public. Putnam’s level of deception, incompetence and negligence is truly shocking. The Department of Agriculture cannot be trusted to investigate itself and there must must be an independent investigation, conducted by the Legislature, into Putnam and his Department’s dangerous mismanagement of the concealed carry system.”

The Politico report is just the latest scandal to emerge in the past week about Adam Putnam’s mismanagement of the concealed carry system. Last week, the Associated Press reported that the Department of Agriculture had between 2010 and 2012 issued 99 concealed carry permits and allowed a felon to become a security guard. And on Friday, The Tampa Bay Times published a devastating report on the culture of negligence and incompetence at the Department of Agriculture.