Wednesday, July 16, 2025
chris wilson desantis

DeSantis Data Chief Was Fired & Sued for Diverting Profits, Stealing Docs, & Computer Fraud.

Chris Wilson, Head of Data at Ron DeSantis’s Never Back Down super PAC, was fired and sued by his former employer, Qorvis Communications, which accused him and his wife of diverting profits by secretly billing clients directly, and stealing some 28,000 confidential files to help establish a rival firm. An arbitration concluded, in 2008, that Wilson had to pay the firm a sum of $366,037.72 for a breach of his contractual duty of loyalty:

In its complaint, Qorvis alleged that Wilson, along with others, conspired to form their own business in the fall of 2003 and thereafter “proceeded to divert lucrative business opportunities to themselves and divide hundreds of thousands of dollars in proceeds among themselves.” It also alleged that Wilson and others “downloaded over 14 gigabytes (28,404 individual files) of Qorvis’ highly confidential and proprietary information” for purposes of pursuing the new endeavor. The 16-count complaint contended that Wilson breached the 2003 employment agreement, breached his duty of loyalty and duty to maintain confidentiality of employer information, interfered with contractual and business relationships between Qorvis and others, misappropriated trade secrets, converted Qorvis’ property and trade secrets for his own commercial use, and committed computer fraud.

Wilson recently expressed irritation when his polling company, WPA Intelligence, was exposed for placing an article in Newsweek, promoting an anti-Trump poll without disclosing that he works directly for DeSantis’s super PAC.

Wilson also worked as a data guru for Ted Cruz’s failed presidential campaign in 2016, as well as for anti-Trump Governor Kevin Stitt (OK), anti-Trump Senator Kevin Cramer (ND), and RINO Governor Brian Kemp in Georgia. He has also worked for the failed campaigns of Martha McSally in Arizona, Adam Laxalt and Dean Heller in Nevada, as well as Matt Rosendale in Montana.

While at Qorvis, one of Wilson’s roles was to assist Saudi Arabia in its efforts to rehabilitate its image following 9/11, which involved 15 Saudi hijackers, some with links to the Saudi government.

Pfizer was another “major client” of Wilson’s firm, who is also reported to have “worked closely” with Karl Rove, a Bush-world RINO and Never Trumper.

Wilson’s partner and chief operating officer Bryan Allen, who contributes the ‘A’ to WPA Intelligence, is an alumnus of Public Opinion Strategies (POS), an even more controversial DeSantis pollster with links to Rove, Paul Ryan, Mitt Romney, and even George Soros.

Allen is also an anti-Trump partisan, accusing the former president of “going full infowars on 9-11” and alleging the only difference between him and Bernie Sanders is that “Bernie really believes the crap that comes out of his mouth.”

Such sentiments are common at WPA Intelligence, with Chief Research Officer Trevor Smith claiming that Trump “is the establishment” and that his election fundraising is a “scam”, for example.

Wilson is currently being sued by his ex-wife Kathryn, who alleges “he ripped off a data software, Archimedes, that they built together when they were married, but that she acquired in the divorce. She is claiming that the version he’s using now to collect data on voters, Bonfire, is just a modification of Archimedes and she’s demanding that he stop using it, along with other damages.”

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Chris Wilson, Head of Data at Ron DeSantis's Never Back Down super PAC, was fired and sued by his former employer, Qorvis Communications, which accused him and his wife of diverting profits by secretly billing clients directly, and stealing some 28,000 confidential files to help establish a rival firm. An arbitration concluded, in 2008, that Wilson had to pay the firm a sum of $366,037.72 for a breach of his contractual duty of loyalty: show more

Editor’s Notes

Behind-the-scenes political intrigue exclusively for Pulse+ subscribers.

RAHEEM J. KASSAM Editor-in-Chief
Ron has the best people, clearly! But if you want a little more on this, WPA is also closely tied to Jeff Roe, as well as his other major client (other than DeSantis), Virginia Governor Glenn Youngkin, who is still mulling a late entry into the GOP primary, himself
Ron has the best people, clearly! But if you want a little more on this, WPA is also closely tied to Jeff Roe, as well as his other major client (other than DeSantis), Virginia Governor Glenn Youngkin, who is still mulling a late entry into the GOP primary, himself show more
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Newsweek Failed to Disclose Anti-Trump Op-Ed Written by DeSantis Pollsters.

Corporate media outlet Newsweek has been caught failing to disclose that an opinion editorial attacking former President Donald Trump was written by two employees of a polling firm whose founder and CEO is the chief pollster for the pro-DeSantis SuperPAC Never Back Down. The authors, Byron Allen and Amanda Iovino, are both employees of WPA Intelligence, and used their op-ed column to claim Trump is losing white voters, passing off Never Back Down talking points as thin analysis. Newsweek makes no mention of WPA Intelligence’s affiliation with Never Back Down.

Chris Wilson, the founder and CEO of WPA Intelligence, serves as the data director and chief pollster for the Never Back Down SuperPAC. Outside of his polling duties, Wilson appears to be a close confidant of the PAC’s chief strategist Jeff Roe – the two recently launching an AI chatbot that they hope will sway voters to DeSantis through text messages.

WPA Intelligence’s Byron Allen has also produced polling for the anti-Trump group Club for Growth. In November of last year, the Club released polling done by Allen suggesting Ron DeSantis held an 11 point lead over Donald Trump in Iowa and a 15 point lead in New Hampshire. At the time, there was a strong effort among Trump’s detractors to push a narrative that the former President faced crumbling support within the Republican Party. Recent polling shows Trump with a 23 to 37 point lead over DeSantis in Iowa and a lead of 14 to 40 points in New Hampshire.

Allen has not hidden his personal disdain for Trump, posting on X (formerly Twitter) in 2015 during the presidential primary: “Difference between Bernie and Trump is that I think Bernie really believes the crap that comes out of his mouth.”Allen has also accused Trump of being a 9/11 Truth conspiracy theorist and suggested the former President couldn’t find Benghazi on a map.

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Corporate media outlet Newsweek has been caught failing to disclose that an opinion editorial attacking former President Donald Trump was written by two employees of a polling firm whose founder and CEO is the chief pollster for the pro-DeSantis SuperPAC Never Back Down. The authors, Byron Allen and Amanda Iovino, are both employees of WPA Intelligence, and used their op-ed column to claim Trump is losing white voters, passing off Never Back Down talking points as thin analysis. Newsweek makes no mention of WPA Intelligence's affiliation with Never Back Down. show more