Former Congressional Candidate Elijah Manley Charged With Written Threats Over Post Backing Angie Nixon

Elijah Manley, a 27-year-old Fort Lauderdale Democrat who ran for Congress in South Florida this year, was booked into the Broward County jail Friday night on two counts of writing or sending threats to kill or do bodily injury, according to jail records cited by NBC 6, WSVN and Local 10. The charges stem from a social media post in which Manley urged people to vote for Democratic U.S. Senate candidate Angie Nixon and, according to WLRN, warned that anyone who did not would have their head cut off.

Manley, who finished third in the August Democratic primary for Florida's 20th Congressional District, had said publicly on Thursday that he planned to surrender to the Broward Sheriff's Office. He has called the case a First Amendment matter. He has not been convicted of any crime, and the charges are accusations that prosecutors will have to prove in court.

What Manley is accused of

According to WLRN, which reported on the post Thursday before Manley turned himself in, the message encouraged people to vote for Nixon and then added a line saying that anyone not doing so would have their head cut off, with an expletive. WSVN reported that the posts were made on Facebook and that Manley is accused of threatening to kill people who did not vote for Nixon.

Local 10 reported that it had not been able to find or independently verify the post Manley is accused of writing. Authorities have not publicly released an arrest report describing the case, and the people listed as victims have not been identified.

Manley faces two counts of intimidation by writing or sending threats to kill or injure, according to NBC 6. In Florida, sending a written or electronic threat to kill or do bodily harm is a second-degree felony under Section 836.10 of the Florida Statutes, as WLRN noted. A second-degree felony in Florida carries a maximum penalty of up to 15 years in prison, though actual sentences depend on a defendant's record and the state's sentencing guidelines.

Bond, release conditions and conflicting jail reports

NBC 6 and WSVN reported that Manley's bond was set at $40,000. The Broward State Attorney's Office told Local 10 that a judge issued an order Thursday spelling out his release conditions. According to the office and NBC 6, those conditions include standard pretrial release, a ban on possessing weapons or ammunition, no contact with the victims and a prohibition on posting to social media.

Accounts of his status on Saturday differed. WSVN reported that Manley had posted bail as of Saturday morning. Local 10 reported that jail records showed he had posted a $4,000 bond but remained at the Broward County Main Jail as of Saturday morning. The difference between the $40,000 figure and the $4,000 figure was not explained in those reports.

Broward prosecutors step aside

The Broward State Attorney's Office will not prosecute the case. Office spokesperson Paula McMahon said in a statement to NBC 6 that the office was stepping aside because the listed victims have taken part in several charitable drives organized by the office over the years. The office told Local 10 it has asked Gov. Ron DeSantis to assign the case to another state attorney's office because of that conflict of interest.

Florida governors routinely reassign cases by executive order when a local prosecutor has a conflict. Until that happens, it is not clear which circuit will handle the prosecution or when formal charging decisions will be made. In Florida, an arrest charge is not the same as a formal charge: the assigned state attorney will decide whether to file an information, and on what counts.

Manley's First Amendment argument

In his comments to WLRN on Thursday, Manley called the situation a "serious first amendment issue" and indicated that he may pursue legal action. He also told the station, "The President of the United States says worse."

The question of when violent language online becomes a crime has been tested repeatedly in court. In its 2023 decision in Counterman v. Colorado, the U.S. Supreme Court held that prosecutors in a true-threat case must show that the speaker at least recklessly disregarded a substantial risk that the words would be understood as a threat of violence. Florida's written-threat statute has been the basis for many prosecutions over social media posts, and defense lawyers frequently raise free speech arguments in those cases. How the court weighs Manley's argument will depend on evidence that has not yet been made public, including the full text and context of the post.

Who Manley is

Manley has been a frequent candidate in Broward County. According to WLRN, he ran unsuccessfully for state House seats in 2020 and 2022 before entering this year's congressional race. In the Democratic primary for the 20th District, he finished third behind U.S. Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz, who won the nomination, NBC 6 reported.

During the primary, Manley was a sharp critic of Wasserman Schultz, who switched to the 20th District after the Republican-led Legislature and DeSantis redrew Florida's congressional map. WLRN reported that at a candidate forum in June, Manley accused her of running in what had long been a historically Black seat. The district had been represented by a Black member of Congress since the late Alcee Hastings first won it in 1993, and its population is 42% Black, according to WLRN.

The Senate race at the center of the post

The post at issue promoted Nixon, a Jacksonville Democrat who is challenging Republican U.S. Sen. Ashley Moody in the Nov. 3 general election. WLRN reported that Moody leads in recent polling. Nothing in the reporting so far indicates that Nixon's campaign had any connection to the post, and the campaign has not been reported to have commented on the arrest.

The arrest comes days before early voting opens in most of Florida's large counties for the Nov. 3 election, in which the Senate seat, the governor's race and the 20th District seat are all on the ballot. Wasserman Schultz is the Democratic nominee in the 20th District.

What's next

The immediate next step is the governor's reassignment of the case to a state attorney outside Broward. That office will review the evidence gathered by the Broward Sheriff's Office and decide whether to formally file the two counts, change them or drop them. Manley is expected to remain under the no-social-media and no-contact conditions while the case is pending.

Manley has not been reported to have a lawyer of record, and he has not entered a plea. Under Florida law, he is presumed innocent unless the state proves the charges beyond a reasonable doubt.