COVID-19 Death Of Accountant Leaves Hillsborough GOP Without Access To Finances

TAMPA, FL — The sudden COVID-19 death of the Hillsborough County Republican Party's accountant and chairman of the committee for election integrity has left the organization in a financial tangle, and has friends of the victim leveling baseless accusations of poor medical care at a Tampa hospital.

Gregg Prentice, 61, of Riverview died Saturday at Tampa General Hospital after contracting the coronavirus.

In the meantime, fellow Hillsborough County GOP member and Prentice friend Jason Kimball is blaming Tampa General Hospital for Prentice's death.

At a Tampa City Council budget hearing Monday, Kimball railed against the hospital's procedures regarding routinely placing COVID-19 patients on ventilators, maintaining the hospital is intubating patients illegally.

After Prentice was diagnosed with COVID-19, Kimball said, he was "dealing with brain fog and some difficulty breathing."

"He purchased a pulse oximeter, which showed oxygen around 62 percent, so a doctor friend unwittingly advised him to go to the hospital, not knowing he was advising him to go on a ventilator," Kimball said. "He went to TGH; they intubated him and he passed away the next day at Tampa General Hospital."

He called intubation "a high-fatality protocol" and called on the City Council to launch an investigation into the hospital's procedures.

Accusations Of Poor Medical Care Denounced

"ER and ICU doctors are criminals and murderers," Kimball posted on his Facebook page. "They intubate everyone and stick them on a ventilator for no reason, just 'out of precaution' as the doctor told me — without consent from the family. Tampa General Hospital is evil."

City Council member John Dingfelder was quick to respond.

"I rarely chime in when it comes to people's comments, but that one I think is extremely dangerous," he said. "I think it's a dangerous comment to be spreading to this community, telling people they shouldn't go to Tampa General Hospital."

Dingfelder said the staff at the nationally ranked hospital, known for its groundbreaking research and clinical studies into the coronavirus, is "committed to saving lives. There's no finer place. If I was sick with COVID or anything else, I'd go there."

Council members Charlie Miranda and Orlando Gudes agreed, saying they both received outstanding treatment at Tampa General Hospital when they contracted the virus.

Like Kimball, Prentice was a staunch critic of White House chief medical adviser Dr. Anthony Fauci and repeated the Hillsborough GOP's position of opposing face masks and mandatory vaccinations.

Prentice proclaimed, "END FAUCISM," on his Facebook page May 13.

In April 2020, a month after the pandemic was declared, he posted the comment, "We need more socialist distancing than we do social distancing."

At its annual Lincoln Dinner on Aug. 27, the Hillsborough GOP's major fundraiser, the guest speaker was U.S. Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, an outspoken opponent of coronavirus vaccines.

Photos of the well-attended fundraiser shows attendees devoid of face masks.

In his Facebook posts following Prentice's death, Kimball referred to the coronavirus as a "genetically engineered virus," he and advocated alternative treatments including taking vitamin C, monoclonal antibody treatments and corticosteroids.

He pointed to an EVMS Medical Group coronavirus protocol document that advises people to avoid intubation and advocates the use of the animal de-wormer medicine ivermectin.

"It still hasn't really hit me that he is gone," Kimball wrote in a Facebook post. "I just know we have to make sure everything he has built remains intact and everything he was working on moves forward. He was always so open with his thought process; he shared so much wisdom. All of us who were mentored by him have to try our best to fill the void in Hillsborough."

Kimball did not respond to requests from Patch for comment.

GOP Loses Access To Financial Accounts

Prentice was a software engineer who developed and maintained the software that the Hillsborough County GOP began using a year ago to track donations. He was also responsible for submitting the organization's monthly electronic finance reports to the Federal Elections Commission.

His death has left the GOP unable to access its donation accounts.

In a letter to the elections commission Tuesday, party leaders said they are struggling to retrieve the account information that must be submitted to the commission by Sept. 20.

"Gregg's software converted data from our Quickbooks software to supply the information needed by the FEC," wrote the Hillsborough County GOP. "Gregg did not share the software and instructions with our officers."

Party leaders said they not only have to re-enter the data for August manually, but Federal Elections Commission analyst Scott Bennett told them they may have to re-enter the financial information for the organization for the first seven months of the year.

"We will be struggling to get all of this entered in the proper format by our deadline on Sept.
20, but we will try to do so with our best effort," they wrote.

Hillsborough County Republican Party Chairman Jim Waurishuk and Vice Chairman Jim Townsend did not respond to Patch's requests for comment.