Corrine Brown (born November 11, 1946) is a U.S. Representative for Florida's 5th congressional district, serving in Congress since 1993. She is a member of the Democratic Party. The district includes parts of Duval, Clay, Putnam, Alachua, Volusia, Marion, Lake, Seminole, and Orange counties.

Representative Brown serves on the following committees:

She is also member of the following caucuses:

  • Congressional Black Caucus
  • Congressional Caucus for Women’s Issues
  • Congressional Human Rights Caucus
  • Congressional Missing and Exploited Children’s Caucus
  • Congressional Diabetes Caucus
  • Older Americans Caucus
  • Progressive Caucus

Gerrymandering

Florida's 5th congressional district is a congressional district in the U.S. state of Florida. It stretches from Jacksonville to Orlando. It is one of the most-gerrymandered congressional districts in the country. [source]

From 2002 to 2013 the district comprised all of Citrus, Hernando, and Sumter counties and most of Lake, Levy, and Pasco counties and portions of Marion and Polk counties. The district included northern exurbs of Tampa and western exurbs of Orlando within the high-growth Interstate 4 Corridor.

In 2014, Florida Circuit Court Judge Terry Lewis ordered the district to be redrawn. Brown has promised to fight this change, saying that "we will go all the way to the United States Supreme Court, dealing with making sure that African Americans are not disenfranchised." [source]

Controversies / Political Scandals

One Door for Education

Over the past four years, U.S. Rep. Corrine Brown repeatedly has used her name, office and political connections to steer tens of thousands of dollars to an obscure organization in Northern Virginia that says it helps a range of charities.

Brown has touted the group, One Door for Education — Amy Anderson Scholarship Foundation, as a charitable nonprofit when courting potential donors. The partnership with Brown is curious because One Door — a group unknown to some of its neighbors and several causes it says it supports — doesn’t appear to have the tax-exempt status commonly held by charities even as it has taken in substantial donations.

Brown’s close association with One Door is unusual both for the extent of her financial help and the exposure to a wider audience her backing seems to offer. One Door, based in a single-family house in an affluent suburb 40 miles northwest of Washington, has received money from political action committees, lobbyists and foundations run by people around Brown, a Jacksonville Democrat whose political franchise is advocacy for the dispossessed in Northeast and Central Florida.

Brown also sought donations for One Door as part of a 2013 golf tournament where sponsorship levels reached as high as $20,000, though it’s unclear how successful Brown’s fundraising push was. Invitations — which included One Door letterhead, the U.S. House of Representatives seal and Brown’s signature — were sent to her supporters and city officials.

U.S. Rep. Corrine Brown of Florida and her chief of staff pleaded not guilty Friday, July 8th, 2016 to multiple fraud charges and other federal offenses in a grand jury indictment unsealed after an investigation into what prosecutors call a phony charity turned into a personal slush fund. The 24-count indictment comes after an investigation into the purported charity One Door for Education Foundation Inc., which federal prosecutors say was billed as a way to give scholarships to poor students but instead filled the coffers of Brown and her associates.

Brown and Simmons, of Laurel, Maryland, were both released on $50,000 bail and ordered not to travel outside the U.S. A status hearing was set for July 26, 2016. Simmons, who has been Brown's chief of staff since 1993, declined comment after the hearing. Brown proclaimed her innocence, saying the indictment was “very scary.” She wrote: “I’m not the first black elected official to be persecuted and, sad to say, I won’t be the last.”

If convicted on all charges, congresswoman faces up to 357 years in prison.

National Baptist Convention check

In 1998, Brown was questioned by the House Ethics Committee about receiving a $10,000 check from National Baptist Convention leader, and long-time associate, Henry Lyons. Brown confirmed receiving the check and denied she had used the money improperly. Brown said that she had taken the check and converted it into another check made out to Pameron Bus Tours to pay for transportation to a rally she organized in Tallahassee. She said that she didn't have to report the money, and that she had been cleared, explaining the rally was to protest the reorganization of her district lines, and she did not use it for herself.

Forgery

The Federal Election Commission admonished Brown and Brown's former campaign treasurer quit after he discovered that his name had been forged on her campaign reports. The staffer alleged to have forged the treasurer's signature stayed with Brown and as of 1998 was her chief of staff.

Congressional Accountability Project

On June 9, 1998, the Congressional Accountability Project voted to conduct a formal inquiry regarding Brown. The Project called for the U.S. House Committee on Standards of Official Conduct to determine if Brown had violated House Rule 10. One of the complaints was that Brown's adult daughter, Shantrel Brown, had received a luxury automobile as a gift from an agent of a Gambian millionaire named Foutanga Sissoko. Sissoko, a friend of Congresswoman Brown, had been imprisoned in Miami after pleading guilty to charges of bribing a customs officer. Brown had worked to secure his release, pressuring U.S. Attorney General Janet Reno to deport Sissoko back to his homeland as an alternative to continued incarceration. The Project held this violated the House gift rule, but Brown denied she had acted improperly. The congressional subcommittee investigating Brown found insufficient evidence to issue a Statement of Alleged Violation, but said she had acted with poor judgment in connection with Sissoko.

Campaign finances

During her 2009–2010 campaign, Corrine Brown raised up to $966,669 from fundraising. Brown’s top contributors included CSX Corporation, a railroad-based freight transportation company with its headquarters in Jacksonville, FL; Carnival Corp., cruise line operator; Picerne Real Estate Group; Union Pacific Corp and Berkshire Hathaway, which owns BNSF Railway. Brown’s top industry contributors included those railroads, lawyers/farm firms, real estate, transportation unions, and sea transportation. Top sectors in Brown's 2009–2010 campaign included Transportation, Lawyers & Lobbyists, Labor, Construction, Finance/Insurance/Real Estate. During her campaigning, the largest source of funds was given by large individual companies, which accounted for 54% of the contributions, and PAC contributions, which accounted for 36%. Sources of funds also included small individual contributions, self-financing on Brown's part and other sources.

"Go Gata" Viral Video

Rep Brown's congressional proclamation of the Florida Gators championship in 2009 had a viral following.

 

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