Prince William County Supervisor Jeanine Lawson on Tuesday called on law enforcement agencies to investigate a former colleague for what she alleged could amount to a violation of revolving door laws.
Lawson, a Republican representing the Brentsville District, pushed at a news conference for the Virginia attorney general and the county Commonwealth’s Attorney Amy Ashworth to decide whether recently resigned Republican Gainesville Supervisor Pete Candland’s consulting work for data center developers just months after he left office amounted to criminality.
“While I’m not the proper authority to investigate impropriety or to judge whether any misconduct has taken place, the information raises questions of misconduct that I cannot ignore,” Lawson, who is the Republican nominee for chair of the Board of County Supervisors, said.
During a news conference alongside several data opponents, Lawson pointed to emails exchanged in May between the former supervisor and data center developer Jeff Mulhausen, with Minnieville Capital Acquisition, LLC, where Candland informs Mulhausen that he’s “working with companies to help navigate their projects through the sometimes complicated and unique landscape found in Prince William County.” The company Mulhausen works for filed a rezoning application in August for an industrial park in the mid-county area.
A spokesperson in Ashworth’s office said they received the documents from Lawson’s office and are “looking into it.”
“Let me be unequivocally clear: These allegations are completely false,” Candland said in a statement. “At no point did I violate any county or state code regarding the actions of former elected officials. In the past, I received guidance from the County Attorney on what is permissible, and I have strived to follow that guidance after leaving office.”
He continued, “It is deeply troubling that, even as a private citizen, I find myself the target of baseless accusations. This appears to be yet another attempt by some to tarnish my reputation and hurt me and my family. It is disheartening to see that the ‘politics of personal destruction’ continues to be a tactic employed by some, even at the cost of truth and integrity,” Candland said.
According to a 2019 legal opinion rendered by County Attorney Michelle Robl, state and county revolving door laws prohibit former officers and employees of the county for one year after leaving office from providing assistance to others with matters in which the former official was “personally and substantially” involved before they left office.
He resigned from the board in late 2022 amid public controversy surrounding a recommendation that he recuse himself from voting on the PW Digital Gateway because of the personal stake he and his wife shared in the proposal after selling their home to make way for development. The Digital Gateway proposes 23 million square feet of data centers on 2,139 acres along Pageland Lane.
The Board of County Supervisors on Tuesday moved to schedule for December the rezoning hearings of all three data center projects connected to the PW Digital Gateway, ensuring the development will be voted on by the board’s Democratic majority before new members are sworn in next year. Democrats have signaled their likely approval of the rezonings.