LAKE COUNTY, Fla. — A Horizon West man running for Florida State Senate has filed multiple lawsuits against his fellow Republicans and a conservative media outlet after a barrage of attacks accusing his campaign of being funded by the Communist Party of China.
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Bowen Kou is running to unseat incumbent Keith Truenow for District 13, which encompasses Horizon West and Lake County.
For the past few weeks, the Florida Republican Senate Campaign Committee, which endorses Truenow, has sent out a series of mailers questioning Kou’s donor base.
The mailers have included Chinese references and images of individual contributions, which Kou said led to threats against some of his supporters.
His lawsuits call the accusations malicious and defamatory.
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Kou immigrated to the United States from China as a college student. He said his parents encouraged him to leave after he was arrested for possessing a Bible.
“I’m an American citizen. My passport is right here,” he said, holding it up. “I have the same rights to serve my community, to serve this country.”
Kou currently runs a chain of bakeries and the Fresh International Market Asian grocery store chain, which has nine locations across seven states.
According to financial records, most of his campaign is self-funded, but more than half of his contributions – and 14.5% of his funds -- come from outside the state of Florida.
Kou said those supporters are personal friends and business associates.
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“A lot of them, they are third, second generation American,” he said, picking up a mailer and indicating its design. “They have an arrow pointing to China. Those people have nothing to do with China.”
In addition, he said the smiling Asian man on the mailer supposedly depicting Kou was not a picture of the candidate himself.
None of Truenow’s backers responded to WFTV’s requests for comment Monday. However, the conservative media outlet that ran an interview on the subject – the Florida Voice – did send a statement.
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“We’re real journalists and don’t care about frivolous lawsuits,” the writer said.
Kou said he’s asking voters to focus on his platform of being an independent voice in Tallahassee, and focus on the issues of toll roads, property insurance and illegal immigration – not his heritage.
“I’m hoping this lawsuit bring justice to clear the for the false information in the air,” Kou said, challenging his opponent to a debate. “All [Truenow] wants to talk about is where I came from. America is beyond that. We are one America.”
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