Known for activism, political gadfly faces lawsuits, federal investigators

For years now, headlines surrounding Collier County farmer and businessman Alfie Oakes have centered on his sometimes controversial political rhetoric.

Whether it is urging businesses to buck vaccine mandates, criticizing the Black Live Matter movement while openly embracing the MAGA movement, putting urinal cake with President Joe Biden’s face on them in his store or arranging for busses to take Trump supporters to go Washington D.C. on Jan. 6, 2021, the talk has mostly centered on politics.

Through it all — or some may say despite it all — Oakes has maintained a solid reputation as a successful entrepreneur.

He owns Oakes Farms, which includes several businesses and a farming operation with more than 3,500 acres of farmland growing over 70 types of fruits and vegetables. And he owns the popular Seed-to-Table, a farm market on Immokalee Road in Naples.

But since October, the veneer of entrepreneurial success attached to Oakes has begun to fade some due to a series of legal troubles that became public within a 22-day period. 

One bank filed for foreclosure of his home and other property alleging Oakes Farms and Oakes owe $2.7 million on a loan that were defaulted on; a federal lawsuit was filed alleging the farm, Oakes and an associate failed to pay a vendor $384,333.11 for products; and federal authorities, including the U.S. Department of Defense’s Office of Inspector General, searched Oakes’ home and business. 

(The $2.7 million foreclosure notice, in a somewhat unexpected turn, has gone in Oakes' favor recent days.) 

Oakes did not respond to several requests for comment, directly or through an attorney, to discuss the cases. A half dozen other calls to gauge the severity of the situation, details of the lawsuits or how it could affect Oakes’ political standings also were not returned.

You can be both outspoken and highly successful in business, Oakes told the Business Observer in a July interview on his sometimes provocative approach. “I’ve had a lot of people come up and say, ‘I love everything you do here. I'm not really aligned with you politically, but we love everything else.’”

“Meanwhile,” he added. “the parking lot is full every day.”

Government work

Oakes’ troubles broke out publicly when federal authorities showed up at is his Naples home and at the farm offices Nov. 5.

Mollie Halpern, a spokesperson for the defense department’s inspector general office, says what happened that day should not be described as a raid, calling it “law enforcement activity.”

According to local media reports, agents from several law enforcement organizations, including the U.S. Secret Service, were seen carrying boxes from the home and company offices. Oakes, according to one report, said “Go Trump, fight, fight, fight” to a local television station.

Oakes Farms has a $238.5 million federal contract with the Department of Defense but it's not clear if the work and federal situation is connected. Halpern says “this is an open investigation (and) DCIS has nothing further to add at this time.”

The five-year contract is with the Defense Logistics Agency Troop Support and is for the delivery of fruits and vegetables to Army, Navy, Air Force, Marine Corps, Coast Guard bases as well as schools supplied by the U.S. Department of Agriculture.

The search of Oakes’ home and business happened 18 days after a federal lawsuit was filed in in Florida’s Middle District alleging the farm, Oakes and employee Steven Veneziano had failed to pay a vendor.

Seedway LLC, a New York company that sells organic and commercial seeds, filed the lawsuit. 

According to the lawsuit, Oakes Farms applied for a line of credit in 2015 and in August 2023 Oakes and Veneziano signed a Continuing Unlimited Personal Guaranty of Payment.

Shortly after signing the guarantee, Oakes Farms placed an order, on Oct. 2, 2023 that, according to an invoice included in court papers, totaled $395,246. “Although Oakes purchased and received the products, it failed to pay Seedway in full pursuant to the invoice,” the lawsuit alleges. 

The lawsuit claims Seedway was not paid for $384,333.11 that was due Dec. 31.

Veneziano, who works for Oakes Farms, did not respond to a request for comment through his company email address nor did he respond to a phone message.

Unusual twist

The biggest threat to Oakes personally may have been a lawsuit filed Oct. 14 in Collier County by Farm Credit of Florida.

The lawsuit names Oakes and the company along with Oakes’ wife Deanne.

In it, Farm Credit alleges Oakes originally borrowed $467,500 from Florida Federal Land Bank Association in 2016. That loan was modified twice in 2018 and then assigned to Farm Credit of Florida.

The farm was added as a borrower that same year and the loan grew to $4 million.

Oakes, whose proper name is Francis A. Oakes III, his wife and the business signed a forbearance agreement May 10. As part of the agreement, they agreed to pay off the amount due by Aug. 30.

Yet as of Oct. 9, the lawsuit claims, $2.7 million was owed and Farm Credit began to foreclose on Oakes’ home and farm soon after.

Then, in an unexpected twist, on Nov. 15 Farm Credit filed papers with the court dismissing the foreclosure. The bank did not say why.