Pulp non-fiction: DeSantis dispatches "The Wolf" to oversee election security in Florida

Is there any job Pete Antonacci can’t get?

Just wondering. Last week it was announced that Antonacci, who was once just a humble minion in the Palm Beach County State Attorney’s Office, will be the director of Gov. Ron DeSantis’ Office of Election Crimes and Security.

I guess it’s not surprising. At this point, the frequently appointed, always-qualified-for-any-post Antonacci should have a business card that simply says “Henchman” to keep the reproduction costs down.

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He has been on a dizzying merry-go-round of political missions and assignments since he started doing Rick Scott’s dirty business as his lawyer during Scott’s gubernatorial days.

Years ago, I started calling Antonacci “The Wolf” because he reminded me of Winston Wolfe, the Harvey Keitel character in the Quentin Tarantino movie Pulp Fiction.

“I fix things,” the movie character explained, after being dispatched to direct mob hitmen played by Samuel L. Jackson and John Travolta to clean up a brain-splattered murder scene.

The first clean-up mission for Antonacci was doing a hit on Gerald Bailey, the politically disloyal head of the Florida Department of Law Enforcement who complained about Scott using state law enforcement officers as political props for Scott’s campaign events.

Scott dispatched “The Wolf” to make an unannounced visit to Bailey’s office on a Friday afternoon in December of 2014 and take him out on the spot, even though Scott didn’t have the sole authority to fire Bailey.

“We’ve known each other for a long time and this is not my idea,” Bailey said Antonacci told him. “You’ve got two choices: Resign or retire, and do it before 5 o’clock.”

Scott next sent Antonacci on a dirty-water mission to sandbag the South Florida Water Management District in West Palm Beach.

Without even posting the job for knowledgeable applicants to oversee a $750 million-a-year environmental agency, Scott installed The Wolf as the head of the water district, where his mission was to make sure that tax cuts, not environmental protections, would be the priority.

Under Antonacci, the South Florida Water Management District cut its ties to scientists overseeing the cleanup of the Everglades, in what was supposed to be a joint federal-state project.

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Scott next sent The Wolf to run his beloved Enterprise Florida, the corporate-welfare operation that doles out millions of dollars in taxpayer money to companies that promise to create jobs that routinely don’t materialize.

But he didn’t last long there, because Scott, in an effort to put his thumb on Broward County, Florida’s most heavily Democratic-voting county, installed Antonacci as Broward’s Supervisor of Elections, after removing the elected supervisor Brenda Snipes for mishandling the 2018 election.

Antonacci kept getting moved to new gigs where his job was to fix things

Apparently, when new Republican governors are sworn in they are issued Antonacci, as if he were some kind of human office furniture.

So, DeSantis got busy, moving Antonacci from Broward to Tallahassee, and appointing him in 2020 to lead a powerful group of 29 administrative law judges as the chief judge for the Division of Administrative Hearings.

These are the judges that hear disputes between private citizens and agencies of the state, making important rulings on contract disputes and worker’s compensation claims.

Antonacci was selected over other candidates who had blundered by explaining how independent they would be if appointed.

The Wolf knew where his bread was buttered.

“The voters speak through you and all the appointments you make,” Antonacci said in his interview with the Florida Cabinet. “I would report and be accountable to each and every one of you.”

The loyal soldier. It has worked well for him.

And the good news just keeps coming for Antonacci. Six months after getting his plum chief judge job, he won the lottery for a Florida liquor license overseen by the Florida Department of Business and Professional Regulation.

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The little-known lottery awards valuable new liquor licenses to reflect the rise in population. For every new 7,500 residents in a county, a new liquor license is available.

In a drawing where there were 23,655 entrants, 62 licenses were awarded – that’s about a 0.26 percent chance of winning – and Antonacci was one of the winners.

So, it’s not surprising that now we’re raising our glasses in yet another toast to The Wolf, who has been dispatched to perform a new dirty-work political mission.

Despite scant evidence of voter fraud, other than Republican-orchestrated shadow-candidate schemes state leaders have religiously ignored, DeSantis has created a new elections fraud unit under his control.

The $3.7 million Office of Election Crimes and Security gives the governor an apparatus to cast aspersions on election results that don’t fall his way, especially when it comes to mail-in voting, which has been heavily favoring Democratic candidates.

It also allows the governor to step in and kill election-fraud investigations in places where county and local agencies have initiated probes.

By naming The Wolf to run the election crimes unit, DeSantis is putting a tried-and-true political operative in place to guide the direction and selection of investigations.

But at the age of 73, Antonacci’s starting to age out of the henchman business. Republican governors need to start recruiting new fixers.

Antonacci can’t keep being plugged in forever. The man needs a break and/or a seat on the Florida Supreme Court.

“Peter Antonacci has dedicated his career to serving the state of Florida,” DeSantis said in announcing the appointment. “I am confident he will lead the Office of Election Crimes and Security with integrity and ensure that Florida’s elections are the most secure in the nation.”

Secure for whom?

The Wolf’s on the job again.

Frank Cerabino is a columnist at the Palm Beach Post, part of the USA TODAY Florida Network. You can reach him at fcerabino@gannett.com. Help support our journalism. Subscribe today.

This article originally appeared on Palm Beach Post: Pete Antonacci, a familiar fixer, to head Florida election crimes unit