James Fishback has spent much of his run for Governor in courtrooms. Now he claims, without proof, that likely Republican nominee Byron Donalds is the one who deserves legal scrutiny.
Donalds’ camp says the allegations are “completely false.”
“We will not be distracted by this baseless and defamatory sideshow, and neither should you,” said spokesman Gates McGavick.
Fishback said a “government whistleblower” presented evidence, which he said his campaign “has confirmed,” that an alleged federal investigation of U.S. Rep. Cory Mills also includes Donalds. (Mills denies knowledge of any such investigation.)
A law enforcement source, meanwhile, called Florida Politics to say the allegations against Mills were “absolutely false.”
Fishback alleges Donalds joined Mills in “federal sex trafficking” during two 2024 visits to MGM National Harbor in Maryland. He said the men “paid women for sexual acts” and that both face felony charges carrying up to five years in prison.
The allegations are grave. But given the source, and the timing, less than two weeks before the Aug. 18 Republican Primary, they are hard to take seriously without corroboration.
Fishback said the Justice Department refused to comment on whether it is investigating Donalds, and said Donalds should “speak directly to the voters” about the unsubstantiated claim. The Department has since gone further than declining comment, with a spokesperson telling News 6 Orlando: “This claim is not true. Congressman Byron Donalds is not under investigation.”
The accusation doubles as a closing argument, one that buries Fishback’s own ethical and legal baggage beneath attacks on the Donald Trump-endorsed front-runner.
Fishback owes his former hedge fund employer, Greenlight Capital, more than $1.3 million. A federal Magistrate Judge in January ordered Fishback to turn over Azoria stock certificates and dozens of personal luxury purchases to the U.S. Marshals Service to satisfy a separate $229,000 judgment, which Fishback has said he won’t pay.
He also lost an arbitration bid against Greenlight this Spring after failing to participate in the case. And his former law firm, Abrams Fensterman, moved to withdraw from representing him over more than $150,000 in unpaid bills.
Fishback survived a legal challenge to his claim of Florida residency last month, but only after admitting he voted in D.C. in 2020 and held a homestead exemption there at the time. D.C. requires voters to establish residency before casting a ballot.
Fishback hasn’t been charged, but the exposure is real. The voting violation carries penalties of up to five years in prison and $10,000 in fines, while the homestead infraction is punishable by up to 180 days in jail and a $1,000 fine, plus repayment with interest and tax penalties.
His legal troubles don’t end there. A former debate champion who says Fishback’s nonprofit, Incubate Debate, still owes her $8,000 in promised scholarship money filed a small claims suit in Broward County last week.
Fishback has also repeatedly invoked race in attacking Donalds, who is Black. He has called him a “slave” to his donors and corporate interests, a “DEI Republican” and “By’rone.” Following the residency hearing, Fishback again invoked Donalds’ race while announcing a proposal to eliminate Florida’s three-day waiting period on firearm purchases, which he dubbed the “B.Y.R.O.N. Act,” short for “Bolster Your Right to Own Now.”
He has appeared on a podcast alongside self-described admirers of Adolf Hitler and rubbed elbows with other members of the so-called “manosphere” who traffic in misogynistic, antisemitic and racist rhetoric.
His campaign finances, while not illegal, have raised eyebrows: a few donors floating a quixotic campaign that spends heavily on travel and lodging, plus a wedding that critics on rival campaigns deride as a “shotgun wedding” staged for optics.
Fishback addressed none of that Thursday. He took no questions from the media.
There is precedent for this kind of stunt. Legend has it that former President Lyndon Johnson, a veteran of tough campaigns throughout his political life, once proposed spreading a story that an opponent engaged in carnal relations with a pig. When his campaign manager protested that it wasn’t true, Johnson replied: “I know. I just want to make him deny it.”
