It's one thing to campaign for a political candidate, but it opens up a whole can of worms when you are a sheriff and you do it on the job. Well, Lee County Sheriff Mike Scott may have more to worry about than just the court of public opinion. Federal investigators are now looking into whether Scott broke the law by campaigning for John McCain. Clearly from the mere fact of emphasizing Barack Obama's middle name "Hussein" he was trying to inject race into his speech and thereby trying to link the name with terrorist. That was just wrong.

Officials with the U.S. Office of Special Counsel say they have received so many phone calls from the public that they launched an investigation into Sheriff Scott on Tuesday. The bottom line is that Scott had no right standing on the John McCain soapbox while he was in his uniform.

The question is - did he use his position as sheriff to influence an election? If so, he could be in violation of a federal election law called the Hatch Act.

The Lee County Sheriff's Office receives more than $1 million in federal grant money from everything from human trafficking to bullet proof vests.

But if Sheriff Scott is found in violation of the Hatch Act, the feds can pull two years salary worth of federal funding - the equivalent to $300,000 for the Lee County Sheriff's Office. Or, they could just remove him from office.

Regarding the federal investigation, Sheriff Scott sent us this statement:

"I am on duty 24/7 and 365 whether in or out of uniform. Like every other elected official, I am aware of from President to Governor to State Representatives, etc. We engage in political activities whether for ourselves as candidates or for others. As of this writing, I am unaware of having done anything to generate all this attention other than using the senator's full name." He's missing the point, he did it on the job and in his uniform. What gives him the right to do as he pleases in that regard? Clearly he was in the wrong. Whether he was campaigning for Barack Obama, I would come to the same conclusion.

Bill Cameron in Charlotte County and Kevin Rambosk in Collier County were both reassigned to avoid violating the Hatch Act. Cameron is still under investigation.As for how long Scott's investigation will take, the feds say they'd like to have all of the Hatch Act cases wrapped up before the November election.

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