Nettleton – Meet Tainted Tate Reeves’ personal trainer, Pickpocket Paul Lacoste, who used his fitness relationship with Reeves to obtain funding for his fitness boot camps that were free for politicians. 

Text message records reveal that, in 2019, Tate Reeves met with his personal trainer, Paul Lacoste, and John Davis, the then-Mississippi welfare director who is now sentenced to 32 years in prison for his role in the welfare scandal. A few days later, Davis was inspired by his meeting with Reeves to order his deputy director to covertly funnel $1.3 million into Paul Lacoste’s fitness program, which he called Reeves’ “fitness issue.” Davis texted that Reeves was “very supportive” of the scheme to transfer taxpayer dollars meant for working families to Lacoste’s fitness boot camps.

Lacoste then used the stolen taxpayer dollars to pay himself a monthly salary of “about $11,000,” buy himself a $70,000 vehicle, a $20,000 trailer, and treat himself and his friends to steak dinners. He made enough money from stolen welfare funds that the fitness boot camps he hosted were free for politicians like Tate Reeves.

While receiving $1.3 million in illegal welfare payments, Lacoste appeared in a campaign commercial endorsing Reeves’ campaign for Governor. Lacoste said it better than we ever could in that endorsement video, saying, “I’ve seen sweat pouring off his face and those glasses of Tate’s fogged up from intensity…” Paul knew he could get taxpayer dollars one way or the other and had Reeves so wrapped around his finger that he said he would “bring the hammer down” on Reeves and another lawmaker in their workout if they didn’t give now guilty former welfare director John Davis the budget he wanted. After this, Paul Lacoste got the $1.3 million he wanted, and Tate didn’t have to sweat as much. Boy, does it pay to be Tate Reeves’ personal trainer!

“Pickpocket Paul will follow Tate Reeves around the Neshoba County Fair today just like his shadow follows Tate around his entire corrupt political career. No matter where Tate Reeves goes, the stench of his corrupted cronies will follow him because when the investigator got too close, Tate Reeves fired him to protect his tainted friends,” said Michael Beyer, Communications Director for Brandon Presley. 

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