Dear Friend,
Florida’s 2021 Legislative Session is, mercifully, over. So this is our final weekly session review — at least for now, since we’ll be back in Tallahassee again later this month for a special session on gambling. (Click here for last week’s review.)
One of the biggest updates from last week is the passage of Florida’s state budget. Thanks to $10.4 billion from the American Rescue Plan we signed off on a record $101.5 billion state budget. Read more about it here, and RSVP for next week’s Legislative Debrief for a deeper dive into the budget.
If you’re not doing so already, please consider keeping up to date with us through our social media accounts, including Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and YouTube.
Onward together,
Rep. Anna V. Eskamani
UPDATED COVID19 GUIDE
Up first, as always: The latest version of our COVID-19 Guide (español), along with our Unemployment Issues blog post and our guidance for renters. If you are facing issues with your unemployment claim, please fill out our DEO escalation form here.
We’ve also updated our COVID-19 Guide, and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) unveiled updated guidelines on Tuesday detailing activities that vaccinated people can safely resume, including attending small outdoor gatherings without the need to wear a mask. See below graphic for new guidance.
Also, Florida’s Work Search Requirement within the Unemployment System has been waived until May 29th. If you’re still facing issues with your Unemployment Claim, please fill out our escalation form here.
If you are at least one month behind in rent and live in Orange County you may be eligible for the County’s Rental Assistance Program. Note that if you live in the City of Orlando, you will have to wait till their rental assistance program is available and are not eligible for Orange County’s program. Click here for Orange County’s Program, click here for Orlando’s program.
Not in Orange County or Orlando? Visit the website of your local governments to see what programs they might have available to you.
The Small Business Administration has also made available several new programs to support small businesses. This includes the Shuttered Venue Operators Grant and Restaurant Revitalization Fund (RRF). Click here for a list of all SBA Programs.
Speaking of small businesses, be sure to check out our 47 Means Business blog where we’re highlighting a local small business every week! One of our most recent spotlights focuses on Uyen Tran of Le Ky Patisserie!
Florida Passes Georgia-Style Voter Suppression Bill
Proving once again how desperate they are to hang on to power by any means necessary, Republicans in the Legislature passed a Georgia-style elections law that is meant to make it harder for people to vote — particularly people of color, young folks and the elderly.
Elections supervisors from across the state– including Republicans — testified that SB 90 was not only unnecessary after Florida conducted one of the smoothest elections in the country last fall but that it would be actively destructive to our democracy. Yet Tallahassee Republicans rammed it through anyway with less than 24 hours to go in the session.
After a year in which Democrats outperformed Republicans in voting by mail, this bill does everything it can to make voting by mail more difficult: It imposes new obstacles to casting a mail ballot, severely limits who can return a mail ballot and restricts the location of mail ballot drop boxes.
This, of course, is just the latest in a long line of attacks by the Florida Legislature on people’s right to vote. Remember, for instance, how they deliberately undermined Amendment Four, which was supposed to restore voting rights to returning citizens who had completed their felony sentences, by imposing a de facto poll tax.
Systemic racism remains a core plank of Tallahassee Republicans’ political strategy. Only now it masquerades under “election integrity” and “law and order” rhetoric.
As my friend and colleague Rep. Geraldine Thompson (D-Orlando) said on the House floor, “Jim Crow today wears a suit, carries a briefcase and is now James Crow, Esquire.”
Legislature Uses Last-Minute Ploy to Attack Trans Kids
Republican lawmakers apparently just couldn’t leave Tallahassee this year without attacking and exploiting some of the most vulnerable people in our state.
I’m talking about the disgusting and transphobic piece of legislation meant to forbid our transgender girls and women from competing in girls’ and women’s high school and college sports, which looked like it was mercifully dead going into the last week of session. But legislative leaders used an eleventh hour ploy to resurrect the bill by amending it on to a completely unrelated bill dealing with charter schools.
I was disgusted by all the smug high-fiving among Republican colleagues, who were so pleased with themselves for finding a procedural loophole through which they could continue to demagogue and exploit some of the most marginalized people in our state. They happily voted for this transphobic bill even though they had no idea how it would actually work; I watched some Republican lawmakers frantically Googling questions about birth certificates because they couldn’t answer even basic questions raised by Democrats.
As I said after the vote: It was a sad day for Florida.
The Florida Legislature Tries to Cancel the NCAA But Fails
In their haste to ostracize trans kids, Republicans also snuck through another little-noticed provision in that charter school bill that would have delayed by another year a new law that is meant to allow NCAA athletes to share in the profits earned off the use of their names, images and likenesses in things like video games.
This was apparently done because Republicans were afraid that the NCAA would respond to their disgusting transgender kids sports ban by moving major events — like NCAA Tournament basketball games — out of Florida. And rather than simply not attack trans kids, Republicans chose to attack NCAA student athletes, too.
Only this time, they immediately backed down in the face of angry protests from athletes, university administrators and college athletic boosters. So Republican lawmakers rushed another hastily written law out the door on Friday that attempted to save face by rescinding that one-year ban — but also forbidding universities from using state money to pay NCAA membership dues if the NCAA canceled events because of the trans kids sports ban.
It was all empty rhetoric: Our universities already use privately raised money to pay their NCAA dues. But Tallahassee Republicans wanted to look tough while bullying trans kids.
It would have been funny if it weren’t so cruel. But here’s what I want to know and what I asked on the House floor: Why do some voices matter to my Republican colleagues but not others? Why do they choose to listen to a bunch of athletes and sports fans but not the families of trans kids?
Doing the Cruise Industry’s Bidding
Republican lawmakers also used a last-minute procedural trick to do the cruise industry’s bidding — and undo the will of voters in Key West.
A bill to overturn three voter-approved referendums in Key West that were designed to stop big cruise ships from destroying vulnerable coral reefs appeared to be dead. But Republicans revived in the final week of session by amending it onto a completely unrelated transportation bill and then steamrolling the combined measure through the House and the Senate all within a matter of hours.
Republicans passed this awful legislation after a Key West pier operator — who profits when big cruise ships dock in the small island city — gave $1 million to Gov. Ron DeSantis’ political committee. I tried to amend the bill to prevent this kind of grotesque, pay-to-play policymaking, but my Republican colleagues voted it down.
This was also just one of many attacks on home rule that we saw in Tallahassee again this year. In the final week, the Legislature also passed bills that prevent local governments from taking action on everything from clean energy goals to gas station security to businesses operated in residential neighborhoods. I voted no on all of these bills.
De-Platforming Everyone But Disney
During the final week of session, we saw exactly what happens when the culture-war promises that Republican legislators make to their base voters run into opposition from the big businesses that bankroll their campaigns.
Big Business wins.
We saw two clear examples of that last week. The first involved the ridiculous “de-platforming” crusade that Gov. Ron DeSantis and House Speaker Chris Sprowls waged against big tech companies after outlets like Twitter and Facebook stopped publishing the seditious lies and incitements to violence posted by President Trump.
To curry favor with Trump voters — and to distract them from the fact that they were doing things like raising their taxes so they could cut taxes for businesses — Tallahassee Republicans wrote a sloppy, probably unconstitutional piece of legislation that could subject companies to fines of up to $250,000 per day if they suspend the accounts of certain candidates for political office.
But guess who didn’t like that idea? Disney, which runs a number of big online platforms, including its Disney+ streaming service. And when Disney, which is one of the Republican Party of Florida’s biggest donors, objects to something, Tallahassee Republicans listen.
But instead of scrapping this whole bad idea entirely, they wrote an amendment creating a carveout in the de-platforming bill for any company that also owns a theme park. Republicans even admitted on the House floor that they did this just for Disney.
So under this law, Twitter can’t remove the account of a candidate for office espousing white nationalism, lying about election results and inciting mob violence — unless Twitter buys a theme park.
This is not serious policymaking.
In fact, I encourage you to watch the whole exchange on the House floor to see just how absurd the whole thing is.
Republican Lawmakers Side With Their Donors Over Their Voters
We saw the same dynamic play out with another anti-Big Tech bill that was championed this spring by DeSantis and Sprowls.
This bill would have created new consumer data privacy protections, restricting how companies can collect and use customers’ personal data and ensuring consequences for companies that don’t abide by those safeguards or are irresponsible with personal data.
Unlike the absurd making-deplatforming-illegal-for-everyone-except-Disney bill, this was actually a very good piece of legislation. I voted for it three times — twice in committee and again on the House floor — because we really do need to do much more to ensure corporations aren’t exploiting people’s personal data.
Of course, for that same reason, corporations *hated* this bill. They lobbied against it every step of the way.
And when it came down to siding with their voters or their donors, Tallahassee Republicans once again chose their donors. First, the legislation was watered down so much that it might not have even applied to Google! Then, legislative leaders just killed the bill entirely.
It was one of the few Ron DeSantis “priorities” that didn’t pass this legislative session.
The Legislature Won’t Pass Gun-Safety Reforms Itself — and It Won’t Let Cities or Counties Pass Them, Either
The year 2021 is not even half over and there have already been more than 160 mass shootings across the United States in more than 30 states.
And yet the Florida Legislature refused once again to hear any of the common sense gun-safety measures that I and other Democrats filed in the House this year.
Even more galling, Republican lawmakers last week passed SB 1884 which prevents cities and counties from taking on the gun lobby themselves and passing local gun-safety laws. It’s an outrageous intrusion into home rule, one that prevents local communities from taking steps to protect themselves from gun violence. As I said on the House floor, if Tallahassee can only offer ‘thoughts and prayers’ to victims of gun violence, then we should at least allow local governments to offer more.
EDUCATION POLICY
Last week we shared with you details on Florida’s latest voucher expansion. The Republican-controlled Senate voted 25-14 to pass the bill (HB 7045) and it now goes to the Governor’s desk where he is expected to sign it. Read more here.
On Thursday, a Miami state senator tried to emulate the “vaccine passport” initiative but in reverse, sponsoring a proposal to prevent schools and businesses from requiring people to not get the COVID-19 vaccine. This was due to a private school founded by an anti-vaccination activist in South Florida who warned teachers and staff against taking the COVID-19 vaccine, saying it will not employ anyone who has received the shot. That amendment failed, but you can read more here.
With the legislative session over, the controversial bill that would have made big changes to Florida’s popular Bright Futures scholarship program did not pass. Both chambers agreed to fully fund the Bright Futures scholarship in 2022, but both House and Senate leaders eliminated a $600 annual textbook stipend for some scholarship winners. That elimination means a reduction of $37.5 million in higher education spending. The Florida legislature also cut funding to the Access to Better Learning and Education (ABLE), which helps Floridians pay for private college tuition. Read more here.
Finally, legislative leaders reached agreement on more than $22 billion in school spending, including a bump in money for teacher salaries as well as $1,000 bonuses for teachers and principals. Read more here.
Lots of Promises But Little Action on Unemployment
Lastly, I’m sad to report that the Legislature did nothing this session to improve Florida’s worst-in-the-nation unemployment benefits.
We did pass one bill that will hopefully improve the designed-to-fail online unemployment portal known as CONNECT. But Republicans repeatedly rejected attempts by me and other Democrats to increase weekly benefit payments, expand eligibility to more workers and or extend the duration of benefit payments.
This was one of the biggest failures of the Legislature this session, especially since so many of my Republican colleagues promised voters on the campaign trail that they would fight to improve unemployment benefits.
But we’re already preparing to fight this battle again next year.
ANNA IN THE NEWS
Florida lawmakers pass new voting restrictions mirroring Georgia and Michigan
Florida lawmakers send lifeline to families with brain-damaged newborns
The Matt Gaetz Scandal Speaks to the Casual Misogyny in Many Workplaces
Asked to Boost Jobless Benefits for Everyday Floridians, Lawmakers in the House and DeSantis Say No
DeSantis won big during Florida’s legislative session. Now what?
Matt Gaetz: Democrat calls out ‘bro culture’ as former ally’s letter emerges
Florida Legislature approves bill to make alcohol sales with takeout orders permanent
Gaetz says he’s not going anywhere. Florida Republicans aren’t saying anything.
UPCOMING EVENT
On May 11th from 5:30-7:00pm we’ll be hosting a Virtual Legislative Debrief to dive deeper into what happened during the 2021 Legislative Session. Please consider joining us — you can RSVP here, at this link.
Women of the Year 2021
I also wanted to take a moment to thank Orlando Magazine for recognizing me as one of their Women of the Year for 2021! It’s an honor to be included alongside some incredible local women; you can see the full list here, at this link.
