Gov. DeSantis signs bill making it harder to place constitutional amendments on ballot
Florida constitution.

Florida Constitution
Citizen initiatives serve as a workaround for activists who say the Legislature refuses to act.

Gov. Ron DeSantis signed seven bills into law late Wednesday, including measures that will place additional restrictions on ballot initiatives

The controversial bill (SB 1794) raises the threshold for citizen initiatives to trigger a judicial review and prevents petition signatures from rolling over to the next ballot. Opponents, who say the legislation effectively creates a “ballot for billionaires,” have used citizen initiatives to bypass the Legislature when some believe it’s been slow to act — such as with marijuana.

During the 2020 Session, Republicans argued the Florida Supreme Court is bogged down reviewing citizen initiatives that never earned enough signatures to appear on the November ballot. All proposed citizen initiative that passed judicial review in 2018 earned enough signatures to appear on that year’s ballot.

The trigger for judicial review would jump to 25% from 10% of total signatures required to make the ballot. Those signatures must come from one half, instead of one quarter, of the state’s congressional districts.

Half of the districts is the same sub-threshold necessary to get initiatives on the ballot. Additionally, there is a statewide threshold for initiatives to appear on ballots for public approval.

House sponsor James Grant argued last month that the changes would prevent the Constitution from being used “as a toy,” alluding to constitutional changes based on ballot initiatives as “a whim that lasts forever.”

Critics contend that by pushing judicial review — the process by which Justices determine whether ballot language is constitutional — further down in the process, groups seeking a ballot initiative would experience greater challenges getting funding to promote their efforts. Many deep-pocketed donors hold off on donating to causes until the Supreme Court has signed off because it protects their investment.

Instead, mainly proposed amendments originating from wealthy donors will have the legs to eventually make it to the ballot, they say.

A coalition of organizations, including civil-rights groups, voting-rights groups and environmental groups, sent a letter last month to DeSantis urging him to veto the bill.

“Constitutional amendments that pass do so with almost always a higher threshold than elected leaders,” the letter said. “Why should we want to limit a citizen’s ability to enact change? SB 1794 does exactly that.”

The bill’s other headlining provision lets petition signatures expire if the initiative doesn’t get enough support within one two-year cycle ending at the deadline to pass the ultimate signature threshold — February 1 every even year.

Additionally, the bill would create transparency measures for election supervisors, including to report how many petitions they’ve received and how many have been validated. Proposals with a fiscal impact would need a note on the ballot saying so.

Last month, both legislative bodies passed the bill along party lines. With DeSantis’ signature, it immediately goes into effect.

The ballot requirements apply to proposed amendments beginning with this election cycle, but petitions previously gathered will not expire with the February 1 window. They instead are governed by the existing law when the signature was made — currently two years from when the signature was offered.

After delaying his deadline to sign bills to give him time to address the pressing coronavirus pandemic, DeSantis’ new deadline to approve bills is April 23.

Material from the News Service of Florida was used in this post.

Renzo Downey

Renzo Downey covers state government for Florida Politics. After graduating from Northwestern University in 2019, Renzo began his reporting career in the Lone Star State, covering state government for the Austin American-Statesman. Shoot Renzo an email at [email protected] and follow him on Twitter @RenzoDowney.


3 comments

  • Paula

    April 9, 2020 at 8:05 am

    Disappointing. For awhile there, we thought DeSantis was actually representing all his constituents.

    • Rich7553

      April 9, 2020 at 12:28 pm

      He is, and not facilitating just billionaires who’ve got nothing better to do than lie to and exploit the ignorant masses to get otherwise unconstitutional measures that even the Legislature reject out of hand on the ballot.

  • Gunny

    April 11, 2020 at 12:38 am

    This bill should have been signed decades ago.
    The State Constitution is NOT the place to write law.

    Thays why we have a legislature

Comments are closed.


#FlaPol

Florida Politics is a statewide, new media platform covering campaigns, elections, government, policy, and lobbying in Florida. This platform and all of its content are owned by Extensive Enterprises Media.

Publisher: Peter Schorsch @PeterSchorschFL

Contributors & reporters: Phil Ammann, Drew Dixon, Roseanne Dunkelberger, A.G. Gancarski, Anne Geggis, Ryan Nicol, Jacob Ogles, Cole Pepper, Gray Rohrer, Jesse Scheckner, Christine Sexton, Drew Wilson, and Mike Wright.

Email: [email protected]
Twitter: @PeterSchorschFL
Phone: (727) 642-3162
Address: 204 37th Avenue North #182
St. Petersburg, Florida 33704




Sign up for Sunburn


Categories