Who is Bridget Ziegler? Florida school board member, Moms for Liberty co-founder, DeSantis ally

3/20/24 UPDATE: The Zieglers are suing the city of Sarasota and the Office of the State Attorney for the 12th Judicial Circuit to prevent the release of additional records from a closed criminal investigation into video voyeurism and sexual battery.

Florida Republican political circles were rocked in December when then-state GOP leader Christian Ziegler was accused of sexual assault against a woman with whom he and his wife Bridget had planned a three-way sexual encounter.

Christian Ziegler was never charged with any crimes, but police filed an affidavit seeking access to his Google accounts after he admitted he had uploaded a video he had made of the encounter which the alleged victim said she had been unaware of. Police released records in February showing that the alleged victim told detectives he "had been sexually battering her for years," a list from Ziegler's phone of other women, and text messages between Ziegler and his wife and Ziegler and the woman.

Ziegler, who was Republican Party Chair at the time, was removed from the position on Jan. 6. Gov. Ron DeSantis and other top Florida elected officials asked him to step down voluntarily bit he refused, and on Dec. 17, the Republican Party of Florida's executive board voted to censure the chair, strip him of authority and drop his salary down to $1.

Christian and Bridget Ziegler are well-known as a Republican power couple and staunch advocates for morality and conservative principles in Florida political circles. While he moved upward from Sarasota County commissioner to Florida Republican Party Chair, she fought against COVID-19 measures in schools, co-founded a national organization dedicated to expunging what it considered offensive material from classrooms, and stood behind the governor as he signed the Parents’ Bill of Rights bill (derived by critics as the "Don't Say Gay" bill") based on her work into law.

Here's what to know about Bridget Ziegler.

Who is Bridget Ziegler?

Bridget Anne Ziegler, 41, was born in Schaumburg, Illinois, raised in Wheaton and then in Michigan as the youngest of three children. She attended Florida International University in Miami with plans to work in the fashion industry, according to the Washington Examiner, but left school to continue her job in sales and later department manager at Gucci in Bal Harbour, Florida.

In the fall of 2010, she visited her retired parents in Sarasota and ended up staying, working at ADP and then rising up through various insurance companies for the next 10 years. She also met Christan Ziegler, an up-and-coming politician, and they married. The Zieglers have three daughters.

In 2014, Christian suggested she run for the Sarasota School Board. Then-governor Rick Scott appointed her to the open position in June, and she won a four-year term later that year. Bridget Ziegler then spent the next seven years as one of the few conservatives on the board, regularly losing when votes came up. She joined other frustrated conservative school board members in 2015 to form the Florida Coalition of School Board Members as a rival to the Florida School Boards Association, which they saw as liberally biased.

During the COVID-19 pandemic, Ziegler advocated to drop the mask mandates in Sarasota County schools, arguing that there were no metrics to determine when it could be lifted. Organization at the emotionally charged debates at school board meetings during this time led to the creation of a national movement, the right-wing activist group Moms for Liberty.

What is Moms for Liberty?

Based in Melbourne, Moms for Liberty was incorporated Jan. 1, 2021 by Ziegler, former Brevard County School Board member Tina Descovich and former Indian River County School Board member Tiffany Justice. The organization's stated goal was to empower parents and help them better understand how school districts operate and how to influence district policies.

Moms for Liberty leaders have said the group is nonpartisan but grounded in "conservative values," although all three leaders had Republican ties and the group received funding from Republican leaders. The group grew rapidly into a national organization with 285 chapters in 45 states as of July 2023, with chapters in 32 counties in Florida alone. Moms for Liberty has seen great success in getting conservative members onto school boards, teaching others how to speak up at school board meetings, and helping restrict transgender rights and teaching about so-called critical race theory in schools and universities. Moms for Liberty has been at the forefront of the recent movement to ban books in school classrooms and libraries.

Critics have called Moms for Liberty positions bigoted, homophobic, and racist fear-mongering. In June this year, the Southern Poverty Law Center labeled the group extremist and anti-government.

"Moms for Liberty activities make it clear that the group’s primary goals are to fuel right-wing hysteria and to make the world a less comfortable or safe place for certain students — primarily those who are Black, LGBTQ or who come from LGBTQ families," the Southern Poverty Law Center said.

Ziegler left the organization in the spring of 2021 to concentrate on her other obligations. She has defended the group but is no longer affiliated with it, and she is not listed as one of the founders on the Moms for Liberty website.

Bridget Ziegler and Ron DeSantis

Both Zieglers have been influential in Florida politics, especially after disagreements during the COVID pandemic led to a wave of conservative activism in schools. Bridget Ziegler helped draft the original bill in 2019 that later became the Parental Rights in Education Act after the Sarasota School Board — wrongly, in her opinion — approved guidelines that would make it optional for school officials to tell parents of elementary school children if they requested to go by a different pronoun. Previously she had spoken out against transgender students using restrooms that matched their gender identities.

When DeSantis signed the bill, which prohibits the mention of gender identity and sexual orientation, bans discussions that aren't "age-appropriate" without defining what that means, and allows any parent to sue a school district over teaching they don't like with the district paying the bill, Ziegler was standing behind him. The anti-mask-and-COVID-vaccine movement, combined with what critics called the "Don't Say Gay" law, kicked off DeSantis' campaign to eradicate "wokeness" and seemingly any acknowledgment of gender identity, sexuality and the racial issues mistakenly called critical race theory from the state.

DeSantis gave a speech at a Moms for Liberty annual summit and took the unusual step of endorsing Ziegler for her re-election. After he entered into a feud with Disney World when then-CEO Bob Chapek criticized the Parents' Bill of Rights law, he moved to dissolve its governing board and establish a new board filled with his appointees. Ziegler was one of them.

What is Bridget Ziegler doing now?

Ziegler was formerly the chair of the Sarasota County School Board but remains a member, and she is a member of the Central Florida Tourism Oversight District overseeing Disney World infrastructure. She was serving as the director of school board programs for The Leadership Institute, a national nonprofit that trains conservatives to run for office but apparently resigned after the scandal as her profile no longer appears on the staff directory.

On Tuesday, Dec. 12, the Sarasota School Board approved a ceremonial resolution calling for Ziegler's resignation. Despite the resolution and hours of public comments mostly criticizing her for hypocrisy, she did not indicate she planned to. Ziegler's term expires in 2026.

Has Bridget Ziegler been charged with a crime?

No. Nor has her husband, Christian Ziegler. There have been increasing calls from Republican leaders for Christian Ziegler to resign, calls for Bridget Zielger to step down, and several prominent Democrats have called the couple out for what they call hypocrisy.

“As leaders in the Florida GOP and Moms for Liberty, the Zieglers have made a habit out of attacking anything they perceive as going against ‘family values’ — be it reproductive rights or the existence of LGBTQ+ Floridians," Florida Democratic Party Chair Nikki Fried said in a release. "The level of hypocrisy in this situation is stunning.”

What was Christian Ziegler accused of?

According to a police affidavit, a Sarasota woman Ziegler has known for 20 years said she was sexually assaulted on Oct. 2 at her apartment.

"The victim and Christian Ziegler agreed to have a sexual encounter that included Christian's wife Bridget Ziegler," according to the affidavit. "When the victim learned that Bridget Ziegler could not make it, she changed her mind and canceled with Christian." But Ziegler showed up anyway, entered her apartment and allegedly assaulted her.

'She told me she was raped': Listen to 911 call in Christian Ziegler sexual battery probe

Ziegler has said the sexual encounter was consensual. He admitted he had consensual sex with the woman  "approximately one dozen times since they first met" and that she had been over to his house twice for a threesome with Bridget Ziegler.

Police have recorded phone calls and messages between Christian Ziegler and the woman talking about that day, in which Ziegler denied assaulting her, and have recovered phone video Ziegler took of the encounter.

On Jan. 19, Sarasota Police said they were not filing rape charges against Ziegler but have asked the State Attorney's Office to review a related investigation into potential video voyeurism, as the victim says she was unaware the video was taken.

In February Ziegler's attorney requested that any release of material discovered through investigation cease, saying that since "his accuser has filed a false report" Ziegler is himself the victim of a crime and Marsy's Law, a 2018 state constitutional amendment to protect crime victims, applied.

Investigators also looked into whether Ziegler broke state law against video voyeurism, as the victim says she was unaware the video was taken but the State Attorney's Office declined to charge him because they found the alleged victim's statements inconsistent.

The Zieglers are moving forward with a lawsuit against the city of Sarasota and the Office of the State Attorney for the 12th Judicial Circuit to prevent the release of any additional records obtained during the investigation and that asks for all communications that are in possession of authorities to be destroyed.

Contributors: Zac Anderson, Sarasota Herald-Tribune; Cheryl McCloud, USA TODAY NETWORK - Florida

This article originally appeared on The Daytona Beach News-Journal: Bridget Ziegler: What to know about wife of GOP leader accused of rape