Former health department employee, Rebekah Jones, granted official whistleblower status
tampabay.com/news/health/2021/05/28/former-he...
tampabay.comPosted May 31, 2021, 1:28 AM UTC
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tampabay.comThis feels very much like a last gasp. Yes, she will be considered a whistleblower but that act doesn't add any credibility to her claims. Every single aspect of this original story has been explained and has been demonstrated over time to be nothing of impact. I think there was a post in this sub less than a month ago that very completely summed up the claims and how they weren't accurate or significant.
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I have responded to a similar comment here:
https://www.reddit.com/r/moderatepolitics/comments/nopbwd/z/h01ezym
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Gotcha don't you think the reference to emails is to the issue of non-residents being included in the dashboard?
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I don't know. I would probably withold judgemnt until the emails come out publicly.
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I don't think that is going to help her. She almost certainly violated the CFAA.
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The CFAA violation (even if it did occur) would not cancel out offenses she alleged occured (if they did occur).
Separate issues.
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She almost certainly violated the CFAA when she accessed state resources that were not available to the public after she was terminated.
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The CFAA violation (even if it did occur) would not cancel out offenses she alleged occured (if they did occur).
Separate issues.
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The CFAA violation (even if it did occur)
I don't think there is any reasonable question on this. Based on the evidence reported so far, she did violate the CFAA. Whatever offenses she has alleged occurred are completely irrelevant.
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How does one get whistleblower status when the alleged whistleblown statements are unconfirmed? This will significantly hamper discussion about Jones, since most people will assume that the former makes the latter true.
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That's the point, now the media gets another set of articles about whistleblower Jones.
In all actuality, all this means is the IG says that based on what Jones describes, if true she would have been a whistleblower.
But the IG didn't say it was true, now Jones must present her case.
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Starter comment:
She has been hailed as a hero. Honest employee fighting corrupt politician.
Then she was tarred as a villain. A nobody hacker abusing the system to make waves.
But the pendulum is beggining to swing the other way.
The key part of the article is:
"Emails from within the agency reviewed by the Miami Herald and others show Jones was asked to remove data from public view after receiving questions about it from the Herald."
This shows me that there is at least some fire for all that smoke.
The biggest takeaway for me: whistleblower cases are tough to judge in the moment because both sides with try their hardest to sling as much slime on their opponent as possible. It's made worth by media chosing sides based on their party affiliation and not showing both sides.
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The emails say Jones was asked to take down a column on the dashboard relating to the “EventDate” of COVID cases. "Eventdate" just included the original dates people reported potential symptoms in early 2020. She resisted but they eventually asked her to put it back up anyways.
Jones somehow flipped this to the Department of Health "asked me to go into the raw data and manually alter figures” and “told me to delete cases and deaths.” Then she backtracked (all of these tweets are deleted) and said "deleting deaths was never something I was asked to do. I've never claimed it was." Absolutely none of this is supported by the emails. She can't stop lying.
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I guess it will depend on what exactly those emails say.
Modifying dashboard is not necessarily wrong. It really depends on specifics.
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This woman's claims have been pretty well debunked. Here is a piece from National Review that does a pretty good job going through her background and claims as well as why they are objectively untrue.
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Best case scenario (if she was right all along) is that she gets reinstated/compensated and those who improperly pressured here do jail time.
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I think her best case scenario is she's used as political ammunition against a politician currently being touted as a likely candidate in the 2024 election. I don't doubt that she would be able to use that publicity to her monetary advantage, whether through some sort of GoFundMe or setting up a nonprofit that rallies against government corruption in the health field and rewards its CEO with a generous salary.
Regardless of the actual specifics of this case, I think it's unlikely to have merit simply because of the current trajectory of DeSantis. These things don't happen accidentally--there is a push to rebrand the party under his image, and they likely thoroughly vetted this incident before making that decision.
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I don't doubt that she would be able to use that publicity to her monetary advantage, whether through some sort of GoFundMe
She has already received more than $500,000 on GoFundMe...
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She already had a GoFundMe iirc
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It is very much worth noting that being granted whistle-blower status under Florida law is extremely easy and doesn't actually make any judgments on the factuality of what is being alleged.
To be granted whistle-blower status you must A) have worked for the state, and B) allege illegallities or gross wrongdoing by an employee or contractor.
Regardless of what she alleges, she obviously meets both of these criteria.
This is an absolute nothingburger.
Which is why I said that key point of the article was not the whistleblower status.
It was:
"Emails from within the agency reviewed by the Miami Herald and others show Jones was asked to remove data from public view after receiving questions about it from the Herald."
The state has denied that ever pressure Jones to change anything.
The other key part:
"A letter from Inspector General Michael J. Bennett said Jones’ complaint demonstrates “reasonable cause to suspect that an employee or agent of an agency or independent contractor has violated any federal, state or local law, rule or regulation.”
So it's A bit more involved than what you said.
Honestly, am not sure who to believe here.
This was known all along, the state said she was told to remove data that she herself added to the dashboard, which was against the advice of state epidemiologists.
So said epidemiologists could fully review the data, and it was episodes like this insubordination that lead to her firing.
Jones however, has publicly (via her Twitter) said she was both told to delete deaths and told not to delete deaths. She is not a reliable person at all.
https://www.google.com/amp/s/cbs12.com/amp/news/local/ousted-dashboard-designers-claims-dont-add-up-former-colleagues-and-experts-say
Here is a Twitter link too
https://mobile.twitter.com/MaxNordau/status/1395550429325369344
It's possible that she is not reliable and that she was inappropriately pressured. These are not contradictory statements.
Believe it or not it's possible to violate law against victims who is less than reliable.
Whatever IG saw was apparently good enough to warrant a reasonable cause to say that Jones' superiors did something illegal.
I am not believing anyone until this whole thing plays out.
That isn't true in Florida. Whistleblower status is Florida is akin to a grand jury. Jones presents her case in her opinion as she sees it.
Then the IG says, "based on your claims, if they are true you would be a whistleblower, so you now have those protections and you can bring your case to prove it."
Best is to let the public decide and release the emails in their entirety. There remains no evidence that the Desantis administration leaned on her to change numbers, or fired her because she refused. Her allegations require evidence.
If there is evidence, release it and blow this whole thing out of the water. But until there is such evidence then she remains a celebrity conspiracy theorist.
So please, Miami Herald, release the evidence.
I would love to see the evidence as well.
My guess is that it will come out during court proceedings.
I also doubt Herald would make this up. So like I said at this point it does seem like there is some fire to the smoke.
But as I also said, it's tough to believe anyone here.
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Wasn't the states actions back in December a little heavy handed? It seems to me that the State of Florida was trying to intimidate her.
Florida Agents Raid Home Of Rebekah Jones, Former State Data Scientist https://www.npr.org/2020/12/08/944200394/florida-agents-raid-home-of-rebekah-jones-former-state-data-scientist
"Florida law enforcement agents searched the home of former state data scientist Rebekah Jones on Monday, entering her house with weapons drawn as they carried out a warrant as part of an investigation into an unauthorized message that was sent on a state communications system."
Her house was raided because she was being investigated for using the Florida Department of Health emergency notification system to send out messages encouraging people to resist DeSantis.
True but they were executing a search warrant for computer equipment at a data scientists home. Was it really necessary to hold them at gun point?
How do they normally execute search warrants? Was this one handled differently? She should get the exact same treatment everyone else does.
According to DeSantis this is how they normally do things, and I haven't seen anyone fact-checking him on it, when normally liberal websites salivate over pointing out when Republicans lie. If he was wrong, I'd see dozens of articles from WaPo, Mother Jones, CNN, MSNBC, etc flooding my inbox. So I'm more inclined to believe his word.
If a Floridian could clear this up I'd be more than happy to change my mind.
Sort of a red flag. https://www.clickorlando.com/news/florida/2020/12/10/video-shows-fdle-agents-waiting-outside-florida-data-scientists-home-to-serve-search-warrant/
Except that's not what happened. The guns were visible sure, but "holding them at gunpoint" is just a straight up lie.