We have to admit that all this blogging about North Miami Beach mayor Michael Joseph is making us feel really dirty.

We know it’s a tough job, but someone has to do it.  So, we will bravely put on our HAZMAT suits and forge on.

After we reported on the Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick ethics hearing yesterday, we are left with a lot more questions than answers.

To be honest, we’re not really interested in the fate of yet another corrupt Congressperson, even if she is from South Florida.  Washington DC is so full of corruption and swamp creatures on both sides of the aisle, that there is little we can do about any of them except try to vote them out of office.  We here at VotersOpinion choose to pick the battles that we have better odds at winning.

Local swamp creatures should be low hanging fruit, but in the case of Mike “Michael” Joseph, he has managed to escape any and all consequences for his myriad of crimes and misdemeanors.

What we didn’t know until recently is how his close personal friendship with Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick, whose self-created image as the girlboss of Haitian American politics landed her in the halls of Congress, would put Michael Joseph in the national spotlight.

And not in the good way he had hoped.

Now that Michael Joseph has been exposed as the alleged money launderer for his good friend Sheila’s congressional campaign, we have a few questions that need answering.  Without further ado, here they are.

QUESTION #1:

What is Michael Joseph’s real name?

This question has been burning in our brains since we first discovered back in 2018 just how duplicitous this charlatan really was.

As we reported in Will the real Mike Joseph please stand up?, according to the city’s website, as well as his official 2018 campaign documents, his name is listed as “Michael Joseph.”

According to the Florida Bar, however, this attorney’s legal name is “Mike Joseph.”

Also, according to the Miami-Dade County Property Appraiser’s website, and Michael’s Warranty Deed dated December 13, 2013, he owns his home in the name of “Mike Joseph.”

And finally, his Voter Information Card from 2020, which we received by Public Records Request, shows that he is registered in the name of “Mike Joseph.”

Since we assume that a person can only have one legal name at a time, we really want to know which of his two aliases is his real name?

Also, while we’re at it, does he have any other aliases?

After all, until just recently we had no idea that his fellow Haitian-American, the former North Miami mayor Philippe Bien-Aime, wasn’t his real name, either.

Seriously, who are these people?

QUESTION #2:

Why did Michael/Mike Joseph form the “non-profit” corporation, Progressive People, Inc.?

Federal Elections Commission records show that Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick received her first campaign contribution for the 2022 election on June 29, 2021.

Sunbiz.org records show that Michael Joseph, Corlie McCormick, and Chantrell McCormick formed this “non-profit” on February 15, 2022.

According to the Statement of Alleged Violations released by the House of Representatives Committee on Ethics, Michael Joseph introduced Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick to the owner of a company called Petrogaz-Haiti, S.A., LLC on April 25, 2022, and four days later from April 29, 2022 to October 18, 2022, “Petrogaz-Haiti and its owner transferred $810,000.00 to [Progressive People, Inc.], an organization controlled by Respondent’s husband and the treasurer of her Leadership PAC,” Michael Joseph.

According to the 2022 Form 990 Tax Return for Progressive People, Inc., the corporation reported total revenue of $910,246, of which $810,000 was received from Petrogaz-Haiti (according to the US House Ethics Committee investigation), and total expenditures of $747,513, of which $725,000 was paid out in the form of “grants.”

At the House Ethics Committee hearing last Thursday, however, Senior Counsel Sydney Bellwoar explained that Petrogaz-Haiti was “primarily funded by the Haitian government during the relevant period,” and that most of the “$725,000 was passed on to a company called Truth & Justice, Inc., which was run by Respondent’s campaign consultant, and spent nearly entirely for the campaign’s benefit.”

While the Cherfilus-McCormick campaign did not receive any direct contributions from Truth & Justice, Ms. Bellwoar’s investigators discovered that the $725,000 this company received from Michael Joseph’s “shell” corporation was directly paid out to Sheila’s campaign vendors and never reported on any of her campaign finance filings.

While Michael Joseph’s “non-profit” corporation, Progressive People, Inc. is still active, according to its 2023 Short Form 990-EZ Tax Return, it reported receiving only $2,500 in contributions and expended $121,313 in the form of grants ($50,000), professional fees and independent contractor payments ($23,100), and office and other expenses, including “program costs” ($48,213).

At the end of 2023, Progressive People reported still having “net assets or fund balances” of $47,700, but has filed no tax returns since that year.

Because his job as Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick’s foreign money launderer, allegedly of course, is done.

Although Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick has filed to run for re-election this year, she has not reported receiving a contribution since November 26, 2025 — probably because she’s been too busy lawyer shopping for her Ethics Committee woes and upcoming criminal trial.

QUESTION #3:

How did Michael Joseph know the owner of Petrogaz-Haiti, and did he know that this company was funded by the Haitian government?

As we reported yesterday, House Ethics Committee Senior Counsel Sydney Bellwoar revealed that Petrogaz-Haiti was “primarily funded by the Haitian government,” to the tune of $12.5 million.

What’s really disgusting is that even though Haiti is the poorest country in the western hemisphere, its government officials think nothing of indirectly contributing to a candidate running for office in the United States.  It doesn’t get any more corrupt than that.

We’d love to know how Michael Joseph became acquainted with the owner of Petrogaz-Haiti and why he was brazen enough to assume that said owner would be willing to finance his good friend, Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick’s 2022 campaign.

QUESTION #4:

Who directed Michael Joseph to give $725,000 to Truth & Justice, Inc.?

We also learned from House Ethics Committee report and hearing that after Michael’s “non-profit” corporation, Progressive People, collected $810,000 from a Haitian government-funded company, it then “funneled the majority of those funds to T&J, an organization controlled by Respondent’s senior campaign advisor, and T&J spent those funds for the benefit of Respondent’s campaign.”

As we explained in our previous blog, Truth & Justice, Inc., a Florida corporation, was formed on August 31, 2021 for the apparent sole purpose of financing several campaigns during the 2022 election.  Although it never filed an Annual Report for 2022, and was administratively dissolved by the State on September 23, 2025, it continued to do business even after it was no longer legally permitted to do so.

In fact, as we already exposed on a November 13, 2023 blog, Truth & Justice was a major contributor to the dark money PAC that “endorsed” EX-Criminal Commissioner Paule Villard’s failed run for mayor in the North Miami Beach 2023 Special Election.

Although we may have already answered part of this question based on the fact that the owner of Truth & Justice, Inc., Gary Eugene Beasley, is a fairly well-known Haitian-American political operative.  It’s quite possible that he runs in the same circles as North Miami Beach mayor Michael Joseph and EX-Criminal Commissioner Paule Villard, who were partners in crime on the dais from 2018 until 2022 when voters told Paule, “YOU’RE FIRED!”

However, with respect to Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick, we’d love to know who directed Michael Joseph to launder Petrogaz-Haiti’s foreign money into the account of Truth & Justice, Inc. for the purpose of funding her 2022 campaign.

Or did he come up with that crooked scheme all by himself in his own diabolical mind?

And finally …

QUESTION #5:

Does Michael Joseph’s boss know about his criminal activities?

We may have mentioned a time or two that Michael Joseph has been employed by a prominent law firm by name of Galbut Walters & Associates for well over a decade.

The senior partner of this law firm, Abraham Galbut, Esq., has been with the firm his father founded since he was admitted to the Florida Bar in 1976, and has a resume longer than Gary Eugene Beasley’s rap sheet.

We cannot help but wonder if such an apparent upstanding citizen and well-connected barrister is completely aware of his employee’s many dirty dealings, evil manipulations, unethical behavior, suspected criminal activity, and general psychotic douchebaggery.

If Mr. Galbut has no idea what Michael Joseph has done and is capable of doing, we will be only to happy to fill him in on all the dirt.

If he is aware and doesn’t care, well that says all we need to know about his own character.

Stephanie