HARTFORD — State House Republicans' chief of staff George Gallo resigned Thursday amid a federal investigation into whether GOP legislative candidates were improperly directed to use a Florida direct-mail and printing company — which received as much as $2 million from their campaigns since 2008, records show.

Gallo quit his $150,000-a-year state job Thursday after acknowledging that he was a "person of interest" in the federal probe and didn't want to cause "unwarranted distractions" for Republican members of the state House of Representatives.

At least four FBI agents set up shop Wednesday in a room inside the House Republicans' suite of offices at the Legislative Office Building, sources said. Among the lawmakers they interviewed were those whose campaigns in recent years had paid for the services of Direct Mail Systems Inc., of Clearwater, Florida, according to the sources.

Among the agents' questions was whether the legislators had been steered to the Florida company, sources said. The investigators continued their work in the building Thursday.

http://www.courant.com/news/connecticut/hc-gop-feds-0221-20140220,0,892125.story