High Springs Vice Mayor/Gainesville PD Sergeant Tristan Grunder to Appear on Dr. Phil Show
Gainesville Police Department (GPD) Sergeant and High Springs Vice-Mayor Tristan Grunder will be making an appearance on the Dr. Phil show sometime in the near future.
The episode was taped in June and is to be aired at a later date.
An article published by WUFT last month confirms Grunder is actively employed with GPD. Grunder is simultaneously the Vice-Mayor of High Springs, elected to seat 3 of the High Springs City Commission in November 2022.
Last month, active GPD Sergeant Jon Rappa made a LinkedIn post where he talked about his feelings on first amendment auditors and confirmed Grunder’s appearance on Dr. Phil. The caption of the post says, “What’s all this hype about first amendment auditors?”
Rappa's LinkedIn video. In the caption he wrote “Catch my partner on the Dr. Phil show.”
First amendment auditing is the action of recording in a public space to test one’s right to record in that space. First amendment auditors often record public officials like police officers and politicians.
Grunder will be joined by constitutional lawyer Eric Faddis, Allied Universal Security Guard Tremaine Newsome, and Auditor Josh Abrams of the Accountability for All YouTube channel.
The situation began on March 26, 2023, when Auditor Sean Paul Reyes of the Long Island Auditor YouTube channel published a video of his confrontation with Newsome and employees at a Veterans Affairs office in Virginia.
After Reyes began recording, Newsome asked him to leave. Reyes continued recording and police were called.
After Newsome’s boss told him to close the door, he pushed Reyes out of the way and shut the door. Reyes alleged that Newsome physically assaulted him.
Reyes said he was invited to go on the Dr. Phil show to talk about the experience but declined.
Abrams said on the Here’s the Deal YouTube channel that the Dr. Phil show asked him to come on and explain what first amendment auditing is.
The show runners told Abrams a police officer and security guard would come on to explain their experiences with first amendment auditors and that a constitutional lawyer would serve as a neutral party.
Abrams said Dr. Phil had been "canceled,” leading to him starting Merit Street Media company. “We're in this studio next to an abandoned church…. They sit down with me for hours before the show…. None of the information relayed to me actually happened on the show.”
Abrams said the show was biased towards Newsome and indicated Grunder was of the anti-auditor stance.
On August 29, 2024, Reyes uploaded a video showing Grunder talking to Rappa about his experience at the Dr. Phil show on their YouTube channel LawMania.
Any more context to Rappa or Grunder’s words isn’t known because they deleted or privatized the LawMania YouTube channel sometime after Reyes uploaded the video.
The following are all the clips Reyes posted from the LawMania episode where Grunder talked about his experience on the Dr. Phil show:
Clips originally republished on Long Island Audit YouTube channel.
Grunder and Rappa both appear to imply that there could’ve been a physical confrontation if Grunder and Abrams were in the green room together.
GPD Chief Nelson Moya reportedly approved Grunder’s appearance on the Dr. Phil show.
LawMania may be gone, but Rappa’s YouTube channel TheLawManiac is still up.
Grunder and Rappa are both police instructors with a business called Advanced Police Concepts.
Last year, Advanced Police Concepts Founder Mike Schentrup taught a class with Grunder and Rappa at the Santa Fe College Institute of Public Safety (SFIP).
Rappa will be teaching a course on interviews and interrogations at SFIP in January 2025.
On August 30, 2024, a concerned individual emailed the Gainesville City Commission about Rappa and Grunder’s public comments.
Adolph Bracht wrote, “These two ‘Law Enforcement Professionals’ conduct on their own podcast display nothing short of a total lack of professionalism and dignity. Frankly, their conduct reflects poorly on not only the Gainesville Police Department, but the entire Law Enforcement profession.”
Bracht went on to write, “Over my sixty two years of life experience, I have learned people normally put on their ‘best face’ when they know they are being watched. Assuming any level of accuracy to that assertion, I would further assert while being knowingly, and voluntarily, recorded would compel even more ‘upstanding’ conduct, as the words and conduct are undeniably memorialized forever. If this recording represents these two ‘Officers’ at the crescendo of their personal and professional conduct, I am appalled…. Citizens beware if you are ever one-on-one, with either of these examples of ‘Gainesville's finest’, in a dark secluded place or worse yet, you're needing help after becoming a crime victim and they should arrive. The mere thought is horrifying.”
Brancht is a former law enforcement officer and served in the U.S. military. He wrote that he is not against police but is against “double standards of turning a blind eye to one group over another because of the clothes they wear, the club they're in, their race, gender, nationality, religion or the flag they fly, [or] another potentially endless list.”
Brancht wrote that if Chief Moya “condones Police Officers dropping the ‘F’ bomb like it's a term of endearment or words of encouragement in public remarks, using disparaging terms towards individuals, or members of any group or organization, and making decisions on the validity of a citizen's right to pursue criminal charges, which, incidentally, a Magistrate apparently found credible enough to issue a warrant for, you have a plethora of issues you need to address within your Police Department.”
