The head of Florida’s Republican Party indicated Saturday he will not step down while facing an investigation into sexual assault, rejecting calls by Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis to give up his role as the party’s top operative.
In a letter to the state GOP, chairman Christian Ziegler did not address the allegation – which continued to send shockwaves through the state on Saturday as troubling new details about the investigation emerged – but suggested a conspiracy was afoot to leak details from the Sarasota Police Department probe.
“We have a country to save and I am not going to let false allegations of a crime put that mission on the bench as I wait for this process to wrap up,” he wrote.
According to a search warrant affidavit, which CNN obtained from the Florida Center for Government Accountability, Ziegler and his wife Bridget planned a three-way sexual encounter with the alleged victim on the day of the alleged assault on October 2, and “when the victim learned that Bridget could not make it, she changed her mind and canceled with Christian.”
Surveillance video showed Ziegler arriving at the alleged victim’s residence on the day of the alleged assault, the affidavit says. The alleged victim told investigators she “opened her apartment door to walk her dog and Christian was standing outside in the hallway.” The alleged victim said Christian entered the apartment and raped her on a bar stool, according to the affidavit.
“The victim advised Christian did not wear a condom,” the affidavit said. The alleged victim said she told Christian “she was not in a place to consent” because “she had been drinking tequila all day.”
The alleged victim later called her sister and told her she had been raped, the affidavit states, noting that police interviewed the alleged victim’s sister and confirmed the details…
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