FACT Calls for Investigation into Rep. Frost for Abuse of Official Resources

Washington, D.C.— September 6, 2023— On Wednesday, September 6th, 2023, the non-partisan ethics watchdog, the Foundation for Accountability and Civic Trust (FACT), filed a complaint requesting the Office of Congressional Ethics (OCE) immediately investigate whether Congressman Maxwell Alejandro Frost of Florida abused official resources for political purposes.

Rep. Frost has a campaign Twitter account (@MaxwellFrostFL) on which he posts campaign materials and links to his campaign website, yet on this account he also directly links to his official Congressional Twitter account. On this campaign Twitter account, he has used official government resources multiple times, including re-posting official government content which contains official photographs, work product, and Congressional social media posts.

Both Federal Law and House ethics rules prohibit Members from using any official resource for political purposes. An “official resource” includes anything taxpayer funded--including all government buildings and House offices, a Member’s official website and social media accounts, and photographs and video from the House floor or Committee proceedings.

Members are also clearly informed that their campaign social media account “may not share, like, retweet, etc., a post from an official social media account.” A simple viewing of his social media account makes it obvious to see Rep. Frost has broken both Federal Law and House rules in this regard.

“Rep. Frost's social media use has quite clearly abused official resources and is troubling. The law plainly requires strict separation between campaign and official acts to both protect taxpayers from funding political activity, and from unfairly benefitting incumbent members of Congress. Violating such a basic rule in a sphere as public-facing as social media is both an awful reflection on Rep. Frost and the House as a whole. While we await the OCE's investigation into this matter, the simple response here from Rep. Frost should be to apologize and, at a bare minimum, delete these past posts and cease this activity in the future--we hope that is what he chooses to do," said Kendra Arnold, Executive Director of FACT.

A full copy of the complaint can be found here.

FACT is a nonprofit organization promoting accountability, ethics, and transparency in government and civic arenas. For more on FACT, visit: http://www.factdc.org/.

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