Jacob Ogles
Legislation that could have required governments to preserve Confederate monuments once again appears in limbo.
The Senate Government Oversight and Accountability Committee declined to take up the bill (SB 1816) following a contentious hearing. While the Senate President’s Office said the legislation can still be taken up at a future meeting, no time was granted to extend the committee even though all public testimony was taken.
Critics of the legislation burst into cheers as the committee gaveled to a close without hearing the bill, and Senators in opposition to the legislation cheered its apparent death.
“Good Riddance!” said Sen. Tina Polsky, a Boca Raton Democrat who sits on the committee. “After two years of this hateful bill failing, let’s finally be done with wasting our time in committees over this nonsense that no one needs or wants. I imagine we never see it again. Back to real issues.”
A similar bill last year was passed in a committee, but with multiple Republican Senators voicing discomfort about the legislation in its form. Within a day, then-Senate President Kathleen Passidomo made clear the bill would not move forward.
But the bill resurfaced this year, now sponsored by freshman Sen. Stan McClain, an Ocala Republican.
The Government Oversight committee was the first to hear the “Protection of Historic Monuments and Memorials” bill this year, and it’s unusual to go through a presentation and public testimony without taking action on legislation. If the bill cannot make it through a first committee stop next week, that likely precludes it being considered this Legislative Session.
Sen. Randy Fine chaired most of the Tuesday meeting, though he left for much of the monuments bill discussion to present campus carry legislation that was shot down in another committee. Due to his resignation to run for Congress, he will vacate his Senate seat after Monday, and said it will likely fall to a new committee Chair to decide whether to take up the bill again.
That decision will likely belong to Sen. Nick DiCeglie, a Pinellas Republican and the committee Vice Chair. DiCeglie led the meeting through most of the Confederate bill discussion. Florida Politics has asked if he has any plans to revive the bill and will update this story when we receive a response.
McClain, for his part, presented the bill as an attempt to preserve all Florida military history that has been on display for more than 25 years.
The bill would create the Historic Florida Monuments and Memorials Protection Act to prevent the removal, damage or destruction of a monument or memorial located on public property falling into that age range. It would allow individuals with a special interest in monuments to bring civil actions against cities that try to remove such monuments.
A House companion bill (HB 1599) filed by Rep. Dean Black, a Jacksonville Republican, has not been slated for consideration in a committee in the lower chamber.
16 comments
Oscar
March 25, 2025 at 7:58 pm
Hysterical leftists wet themselves over Trump renaming a few things, but like intellectually stunted lemmings they have nary a concern in the world destroying Confederate monuments and renaming things that hurt their delicate little sensitivities. Once again the progressive left doubles down on ignorance.
Ocean Joe
March 26, 2025 at 10:11 am
Why would anyone object to glorification of the Confederacy? Its’ embrace of slavery and willingness to provoke the bloodiest war on American soil and break up the country to protect the enslavement, perhaps. It always surprises me that all the carpetbaggers who moved here from up north love our history of forcibly kidnapping people and treating them like animals. Even Stonewall Jackson had serious doubts about the morality of the southern cause. Read up on who Gen. Longstreet became after the war. Or on how despised Braxton Bragg was for his ineptitude. You dont have to be progressive, or even leftist to acknowledge a bit of the history some of these statues represent. Put them in battlefield parks. Florida’s Olustee. They don’t need to be in the town square.
Oscar
March 26, 2025 at 5:54 pm
Erasing history for an already utterly ignorant populace will only ensure we repeat the errors of our past. Like all authoritarians, the Nazis sought to erase any history that didn’t align with their worldview and distorted the rest to their perverse ends. Sounds familiar. Just like today’s radical progressive left. Preserving history does not necessarily mean glorifying it. By your logic we should destroy the pyramids (slave labor), the pantheon (slavery, paganism and more), etc.
Peachy
March 25, 2025 at 8:37 pm
Most of these lunatics have no idea who these people are on these statues. Without the ability to take a picture of the statue and do a “google” search , they have no clue. The famous Lee Circle in New Orleans for instance. An area where many black folks gather for Mardi Gras. I would bet large sums of money that I could take a sample size of folks to that spot. Point to the top of the statue and ask who that person was. Pretty confident that most would have no clue. That part of history has been removed by the history scrubbers armed with the google search machine.
MH/Duuuval
March 26, 2025 at 5:48 pm
Re: NOLA
It was Congo Square before it was Jackson Square.
Go to the same monument you refer to here, at Lee Circle, and ask those same Black folks what caused the Civil War (officially the War of Southern Succession)?
Let us know because your knowledge of Black history appears spotty.
Oscar
March 26, 2025 at 8:30 pm
I think you mean the War of Northern Aggression. Like today’s radical leftist who seek to impose their moronic agenda on others by force.
will be back
March 26, 2025 at 9:26 am
the bill will be back in committee next week and will pass with flying colors
MH/Duuuval
March 26, 2025 at 5:42 pm
Peachy likes a wager — ask him to bet on this.
Michael K
March 26, 2025 at 10:32 am
These monuments to traitors and insurrectionists were instrumental in literally white-washing history through “Lost Cause” efforts. They were also instruments of Jim Crow to remind Black people to know and keep their place. It’s no coincidence that these were often placed on courthouse lawns and proximate to many lynching sites in the South.
With white supremacy finding safe harbor in the MAGA movement, I suppose it’s no surprise to see an effort to re-glorify the Lost Cause.
Harold Finch
March 26, 2025 at 5:07 pm
Weren’t most of our founding fathers traitors and insurrectionists? The Civil War was not just about slavery.
MH/Duuuval
March 26, 2025 at 5:43 pm
No, it wasn’t only about enslaving Africans, just the primary and singular cause that leading rebels never failed to put out front.
Oscar
March 27, 2025 at 6:07 pm
The Marxist progressive left is actively seeking to dismantle the foundations of the republic by rewriting, denigrating or deleting our history, reintroducing racism in the guise of equity, creating privileged classes through DEI and dictating what can be said in public discourse by any means necessary. Marxism has no place in any democracy. Neither do its adherents.
David Dover
March 27, 2025 at 11:37 pm
Anthony Johnson the first slave owner in America was a black man…where’s his monument?
Michael K
March 31, 2025 at 8:57 am
Ah yes, I thought Glen Beck disappeared.
Andrew
April 6, 2025 at 12:48 am
History is history no matter what. You can’t erase (or change) the past no matter how bad an event or a person was just because it “offends” a particular group of individuals. I’m sure that every statue of every person everywhere offends somebody, so what are we supposed to do ?? Do we take them all down, or just the ones that offend a certain “special” group ?? This selective butt-kissing needs to stop. Pass the bill — protect our history !!!!!!
Friday
April 6, 2025 at 8:27 pm
You still can’t hide the soil..so if that statue 🗿 was upsetting. That soil they walk should be worse
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