ALLEGED RAPIST OUT: Ziegler ousted as Florida GOP Chair in unanimous vote
Christian Ziegler and his wife Bridget have both been outed for their hypocrisy in claiming to fight for traditional family values.
The Zieglers both held prominent roles among conservatives, with her helping to found the right-wing extremist group Moms for Liberty, and him as Florida GOP Chair. Then a woman came forward with rape allegations and salacious stories that have cast both in a different light.
The woman says that she, Christian, and Bridget (who fights to remove LGBTQ content from school libraries) had engaged in sex acts as a threesome and that Christian pursued her for further dalliances in which his wife would not be a participant.
When she refused and expressed that she wasn’t interested without Bridget involved, the woman says Ziegler came to her home and raped her.
In December, Florida Republicans decided to suspend Ziegler pending investigation, after he refused to resign.
Now, they’ve voted him out of his leadership role for good. The Herald Tribune reports:
“We have finally turned the page from disgraced and now-former Chairman Ziegler,” said state Rep. Spencer Roach, R-North Fort Myers. “It is time to focus on regaining the trust of Florida voters as the party of family values. We now begin the hard work of fundraising, voter registration, and voter turnout for a consequential election that’s only 11 months away.”
Bridget Ziegler is also being pressured to resign her school board position — and her slot on Ron DeSantis’s Central Florida Tourism Oversight District which replaced the former Disney-operated organization overseeing the Orlando area — though she has not done so at this point.
Meanwhile, her husband may have exacerbated his own legal position.
He reportedly videoed the sexual encounter and is attempting to use it as evidence that what the victim calls rape was actually consensual sex.
However, it could be evidence of other crimes, according to attorney Bryant Camareno. WFLA reported:
Camareno said. “He may have opened up another Pandora box by giving information, or providing proof that he may have committed another crime, but a third-degree felony of video voyeurism is a lot better than a sexual battery allegation because that’s a first-degree felony. You’re going to prison.”
It’s also possible that by messaging the video to the woman, Ziegler could be found to have engaged in harassment or cyberstalking.
Even by the notoriously lax standards of the Florida Republican Party, it was obvious that Ziegler had to be ousted before creating any further damage to the the Party’s brand of “Christian” values.
