Republican U.S. Senate candidate Marco Rubio acknowledged tonight that he put $16,000 in personal expenses on a Republican Party of Florida credit card he was issued while he was in the Florida House. Rubio says he made direct payments to American Express for those charges.

In a letter released tonight, Rubio blames his primary opponent, Gov. Charlie Crist for leaking the statement, which Rubio says at least one media outlet has in its possession.

There have been rumors that Rubio made questionable purchases, but Rubio does not say exactly what those were. The relevant paragraph:

During the period in question, there was no formal process provided by the Party regarding personal charges made on an AMEX account. At no time during my four years as a cardholder did the party ask me to provide additional information about, or personally pay, any of the charges I submitted for payment. I always took it upon myself to identify and directly pay American Express for all non-official expenses. During the two-year period in question, I made $16,052.50 in direct payments to AMEX to cover non-party related expenditures.

To the greatest extent possible, I made sure the Party never paid for any personal charges. In fact, all of my statements were- at least I certainly hope they were- reviewed and approved by former Chairman Jim Greer or others designated by him.

Full letter after the jump.

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Once I had a love and it was a gas

Soon turned out to be a pain in the ass

Those are the lyrics from the album version of Blondie’s 1979 chart topper, “Heart of Glass.”

On Saturday, Republicans will be able to live the lyrics in the morning and party to them at night.

Florida Republican brass have a special meeting in the morning to replace ousted Chairman Jim Greer. Greer was forced out over concerns about party spending and what many felt was his inappropriate influence in primary races.

Of course, the story doesn’t end there with Republican struggles: They have a contested race to replace Greer, hand-wringing over a secret contract that paid the party’s executive director $400,000 and new questions over whether Senate President Jeff Atwater, former House Speaker Marco Rubio and others should release their party credit card statements.

Sounds like a party, right?

Actually, the party is later in the day when the GOP state Senate caucus host the “Universal Orlando Mardi Gras Celebration” to raise money for the party. The tentative schedule calls for an afternoon tour of Disney, a dinner reception and an 8:30 p.m. “VIP viewing” of Blondie in concert.

We caught up with Republican Gov. Charlie Crist on his walk Tuesday afternoon from the Capitol to a training session for new circuit, county and appellate judges to get his thoughts on Florida Republican Party Chairman Jim Greer’s resignation. Here’s the rough transcript:

(Also, here’s our story about Greer’s resignation, the audio from Greer’s conference call and some reaction from Palm Beach County Republicans.)

CRIST: “I’m sorry to see him go because I know how hard he worked particularly in the area of minority outreach and I’m very proud of that. Having said that I think that Sen. Thrasher will do an extraordinary job as chairman. And I have great respect for John. And I think it’s very important to have a unified party as we enter into this new year and a very important election year. So, those are my thoughts.”

Q: Were your thoughts about Greer affected by the letter from the 12 fundraisers? Could Greer have remained in his job after that?

CRIST: I think that was a decision Jim wanted to make. And I respect that. You know, he’s got a family to think about, things like that. It’s been a little rough and tumble, obviously. And, you know, I supported him up to the end, but ultimately it’s a decision he and his family have to make.

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Republican Party of Florida Chairman Jim Greer said this afternoon he will resign effective Feb. 20. Some background on his recent troubles here.

“This distractions and attacks on each other within the party is not what we should be doing. These individuals who have turned their guns on fellow Republicans instead of focusing our efforts on defeating Democrats have done nothing to serve our party. But at the end of the day the future of the party must come first.”

Listen to the conference call here. (Questions start at the 11:10 mark)

Jim Greer speaking at a press conference in October 2008

Thrasher

“Jim has long been a loyal servant to the Republican cause, and I appreciate the many sacrifices the Chairman, his wife Lisa, and their four children have made to ensure our Party’s continued success in the Sunshine State,” Gov. Charlie Crist said in a statement.

“I call on Florida Republicans to unite behind our common values of less government and more personal freedom and sincerely hope that we can move forward together to ensure statewide Republican victories in 2010.”

Greer has been negotiating his exit since a letter
from party fundraisers last week saying he had to go. In addition to Thrasher, other names discussed included former House Speaker Alan Bense of Panama City and former Senate President Ken Pruitt of Port St. Lucie.

Negotiators were far apart over the weekend, but found had a breakthrough late last night.

The transition is a hit to Gov. Charlie Crist, whose U.S. Senate campaign has benefited from his close relationship with Greer.

Thrasher, meanwhile, is more closely aligned with the Jeb Bush-wing of the party, which has always had a rivalry with the Crist team and given significant support to Crist’s primary opponent, former state House Speaker Marco Rubio.

News of Thrasher replacing Greer was first reported by the Times/Herald.

UPDATE: Florida Democrats are giddy about this news. They’re not claiming they’ll collect more money than the RPOF this year. Instead, they say their analysis shows that “the Florida Democratic Party has never been in better financial shape entering an election year.”

The Republican Party of Florida announced today it raised $4.5 million for the final three months of 2009.

That would be the largest quarterly total of the year, and slightly more than the $4.3 million the party collected in the same time in 2007 - the last non-election year. For the year, the party collected about $1.6 million less than it did in 2007.

2009 RPOF fundraising:

1Q: $3.9 million

2Q: $1.3 million

3Q: $3.8 million

4Q: $4.5 million

The announcement comes just days before the party’s annual meeting in Orlando, where party Chairman Jim Greer’s job is expected to be a main topic of discussion. Last week, a dozen of the party’s top fundraisers signed a letter calling for Greer’s removal.

Jim Greer speaking at a press conference in October 2008

A dozen of Florida’s top Republican fund-raisers called for the resignation of their state party chairman in a letter late Tuesday, saying without his removal Republicans had a “diminished” chance for success in a crucial election next year.

“There must be a change in leadership to successfully execute the strategic plan for victory in 2010 election cycle for Republicans,” according to the letter.

Jim Greer has resisted several resignation calls this year from party activists. “He intends to serve the remainder of his term,” Greer’s spokeswoman said Wednesday.

But the letter from the fund-raisers, who have combined to personally donate more than $2.1 million to the state party in the past decade, is the biggest hurdle yet for Greer, Palm Beach County Republican Chairman Sid Dinerstein said. The letter includes names of Republicans with national fund-raising reputations, including Ned Siegel of Boca Raton and Al Hoffman of Fort Myers.

Story here. Read the letter here.

UPDATE: Here are some thoughts on the complaint from Paul Ryan of the Campaign Legal Center, who weighed in at our request:

The complaint alleges that the activity is illegal because, it alleges, Heffley is a “common vendor” to both the Crist campaign and the Web site. However, the complaint goes on to acknowledge that the Crist campaign isn’t paying Heffley and the complaint provides no evidence that the Web operation is paying Heffley. A person or company is only a “common vendor” under federal campaign finance laws if they’re being paid by both the candidate and the outside group that’s running campaign ads, Web communications, etc.

At any rate, it’s entirely appropriate for a person who suspects the law is being broken to file a complaint with the FEC and I don’t mean to imply otherwise here. … It then becomes the FEC’s job to investigate to learn the facts and determine whether the law’s been broken. … If Crist was behind the Web site, or if coordination occurred between Crist’s campaign and someone who paid for the Web site, either through a common vendor or otherwise, then federal law was likely broken.

Here’s a copy of the complaint Tampa Republican Club President Liz Wessel filed this week with the Federal Election Commission against Rich Heffley, one of Gov. Charlie Crist’s top political consultants.

Wessel said there was something “shady and unethical” about Heffley working on an anonymous Web site aimed at embarrassing Crist’s U.S. Senate primary opponent, Marco Rubio. Heffley has maintained Crist’s campaign had nothing to do with the site.

“I don’t think Charlie Crist is playing by the rules,” she said. “He’s reflecting poorly on all Republicans.”

Wessel voted for Crist in 2006 and donated $150 to his campaign that year (her husband gave Crist $4,800 in September). But she said Crist has “let the people of Florida down.”

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An anonymous Web site aimed at embarrassing Republican Gov. Charlie Crist’s political rival appears to have backfired after one of Crist’s top political advisers admitted that he helped develop the site.

This latest twist in a suddenly sizzling primary race is at least the second time Rich Heffley, a powerful Republican political operative, has assisted a shadowy political group on behalf of Crist.

“This was me going off half-cocked and I’ll never do it again,” said Heffley, an influential Tallahassee lobbyist who has billed Florida Republicans nearly $6 million for campaign work in the past decade.

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Heffley

Heffley, who served on the Florida Elections Commission from 1999-2003 after an appointment from then-Gov. Jeb Bush, created a company during Crist’s 2006 gubernatorial primary, Issues Advocacy, that has worked for only one political client in the state: a somewhat secretive campaign committee known as Conservative Values Coalition.

Rest of the story here.

“Not much,” Crist said.

Republican Gov. Charlie Crist was censured on Saturday by the Volusia County Republican Executive Committee. Read Palm Beach County Republican Jack Furnai’s account here

The move was to embarrass Crist for failing to support local Republican congressional candidates in 2008 and for his embrace of President Obama’s stimulus plan. Although it sounds like the vote mostly embarrassed the county GOP chairman, Joe Stich.

Palm Beach County Republicans will consider a similar censure motion next week. Asked about that vote, Crist implied that he wasn’t concerned about the outcome.

“I’ll wait until Election Day,” Crist said.

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