Policy, budget war boils over in Florida Capitol as DeSantis slams 'House of Pettiness'
Heading for overtime and deadlocked on budget talks on day 58 of Florida's 60-day legislative session, Senate GOP leaders lashed out at the House over a string of bills stripped of key Senate-backed provisions, deepening the rift between chambers.
The disdain was echoed by Gov. Ron DeSantis, who dubbed the chamber the 'House of Pettiness,' but rebuffed by House Speaker Daniel Perez, who accused the Senate of 'emotional blackmail.'
The breaking point on April 30 was a bill (SB 1620) that sought to codify recommendations from a task force on mental health and substance abuse, including a provision to prioritize licensing for short-term residential treatment facilities.
The Senate bill included a provision creating a substance abuse and mental health research center at the University of South Florida, and named it after Sen. Darryl Rouson, a St. Petersburg Democrat who has championed the cause of substance abuse recovery after his own battles with drug addiction.
The House stripped out that piece of the bill and sent it to the Senate, where several members decried the move: 'This is what we deal with,' said Sen. Ed Hooper, R-Clearwater, lead negotiator of the Senate in budget talks. 'We will make it right – or else.'
Hooper's remark was slammed by Perez, a Miami Republican: 'I have enormous respect for Senator Rouson. I admire his public service, and I would be happy to collaborate with the Senate to honor him,' the House speaker said in a released statement.
'But the action of the Senate today to name a center after Senator Rouson as a means of emotionally blackmailing the House into doing what they want is unconscionable. The comments of 'or else' were a threat to the Florida House and beneath the dignity of the Florida Senate,' he added.
Perez and Senate President Ben Albritton, R-Wauchula, have been unable to bridge a divide on the budget, largely because of the wide gaps in tax cut plans. Perez wants to cut the state sales tax from 6% to 5.25%. Albritton fears that would slash taxes by too much in future years, when economists project a nearly $7 billion shortfall in two years.
The gap between the House and Senate budgets is $4.4 billion, with the House at nearly $113 billion. After several offers made between the chambers, frustration is spilling into the open after negotiators had been holding out hope for a deal.
Hooper and House budget chief Rep. Lawrence McClure, R-Dover, had already admitted last week that the lack of an agreement meant they wouldn't be able to pass a budget during 60-day session, set to end May 2. That means the Legislature will head to overtime, still needing to pass a spending plan for the budget year that begins July 1.
And the stalemate over the budget threatened to seep into other substantive bills. For example, Albritton's priority 'Rural Renaissance' bill (SB 110) this year is designed to provide more funds, health care and education options in rural areas.
But the House rewrote the bill, watering it down and sending it back to the Senate. Sen. Corey Simon, R-Tallahassee, called it a 'bastardized' version; the Senate rejected the House changes and sent it back.
Despite the rancor, some major bills were completed April 30.
Lawmakers passed a bill to give condo owners more time to pay assessments placed on their units to pay for inspections and maintenance resulting from new requirements passed by the Legislature after the 2021 collapse of the Champlain Towers building in Surfside. The measure is a priority for DeSantis, who has repeatedly slammed the House for pushing forward a condo bill that didn't go as far as he wanted.
He's also clashed with Perez over the lack of movement on property tax cuts, reductions in spending for state law enforcement agencies and a House probe into the Hope Florida Foundation, the fundraising arm of a program championed by First Lady Casey DeSantis.
The foundation funneled $10 million connected to a settlement over alleged Medicaid overpayments through other groups to a political committee opposed to an amendment on the 2024 ballot to legalize recreational marijuana.
DeSantis later chimed in on the spat between the chambers over the Rouson naming provision: 'The Florida House of Pettiness in all its glory,' DeSantis posted on X.
At an appearance in Fruitland Park to again defend Hope Florida, the governor once again berated the House, calling it "dysfunctional and unsuccessful."
Whether any progress is made toward a 2025-26 state budget by May 2, he added that "this will go down as the least productive Florida House of Representatives in decades.'
Perez defended his chamber, saying they wanted to stick to the recommendations from the task force, and the center to be named after Rouson wasn't among them.
'The Senate created a backdoor appropriations project,' Perez said. 'They did so unilaterally, fully aware that the House did not wish to include additional items in the bill beyond the commission's recommendations.'
With the deadline to end the session fast approaching, lawmakers haven't decided whether to extend the session to reach a budget deal or adjourn and return to the Capitol in May or June to complete the spending plan – the one job the state constitution requires them to do.
Gray Rohrer is a reporter with the USA TODAY Network-Florida Capital Bureau. He can be reached at grohrer@gannett.com. Follow him on X: @GrayRohrer.
This article originally appeared on Tallahassee Democrat: DeSantis slams 'House of Pettiness' as legislative session sputters
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Kweisi Mfume is pitching an old-school approach to one of House Democrats' highest-profile jobs
Frustrated by Democrats' seniority system, Kweisi Mfume fled the House three decades ago, saying he could do more to advance civil rights from the outside. Now he's back and trying to reap the benefits of seniority at a moment when many in his party are starting to openly question it. The Baltimore native last month surprised many House colleagues by entering the wide-open race to lead Democrats on the high-profile Oversight Committee, seeking to fill the spot vacated by the sudden death of Virginia Rep. Gerry Connolly. Into the void jumped a pair of young, ambitious members — Jasmine Crockett of Texas and Robert Garcia of California — as well as a close Connolly ally, Stephen Lynch of Massachusetts. And then there's Mfume, who at 76 is making no bones about this being the capstone of a long career that included stints leading the Congressional Black Caucus and the NAACP — jobs he took back in the 1990s. 'I started a long time ago when dinosaurs roamed the earth,' Mfume joked in an interview, before describing his old-school approach to legislative relations: 'The first thing you learn is how to count votes, which has never failed me yet,' he said, adding that he would be careful not to alienate colleagues 'by doing something that causes problems for them in their district.' Rather than detail a point-by-point agenda for taking on President Donald Trump and congressional Republicans, Mfume said if elected he'd convene the committee's Democrats to decide a course of action. The party, he said, can only move forward with a 'consensus.' That style stands in sharp contrast to a Democratic base that's itching for more aggressive leadership and a more visible fight with Trump — something the other candidates are clearly heeding: Garcia has tangled with the Justice Department over his criticism of Elon Musk; Crockett has broached the prospect of a Trump impeachment inquiry; and Lynch, as the panel's interim top Democrat, attempted last week to subpoena Musk during a panel hearing. The race also threatens to become a proxy fight for broader questions about age and seniority inside the Democratic Party. House Democrats ousted several aging committee leaders at the end of last Congress as they girded for a fight with the Trump administration — and many in the base were disappointed when Connolly triumphed over Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York. The winner is poised to lead efforts to investigate and thwart the Trump administration if Democrats can retake the House majority next year — and ride herd on a chaotic panel that in recent months has featured intense personal attacks between lawmakers and the display of nude photos. 'It's a street fight every day,' said Rep. Lateefah Simon of California when asked about the panel and what it takes to lead it. 'It's every single day being able to expose the hypocrisy of this administration and to tell the truth.' There was a time when Mfume would have been a natural choice for such a moment. First elected to Baltimore's City Council at the age of 30, he quickly butted heads with legendary Mayor William Donald Schaefer. After longtime Rep. Parren Mitchell retired, Mfume easily won the seat in 1986 and within a few years become a national figure due to his chairmanship of the CBC. Ascending to that role just as Bill Clinton was elected to the presidency, he became an important power broker, forcing key concessions in Clinton's 1993 budget and pushing the White House to restore ousted Haitian president Jean-Bertrand Aristide to power. He also clashed with Clinton at times, including over his decision to pull the nomination of prominent Black legal scholar Lani Guinier to a top Justice Department post. But after Democrats lost their House majority in 1994 — and Mfume lost a quixotic bid to enter the party leadership — he decided two years later to forgo a long climb up the seniority ladder. He instead took the helm at the Baltimore-based NAACP, a job thought to better harness his skills at organizing and oratory. Former Maryland state Sen. Jill Carter said Mfume has long had the 'it factor' and 'charisma' that matters in politics. When Carter ran against Mfume in his 2020 House comeback bid, she got a reminder of how well her rival was known in the district and beyond: 'When some of my people did exit polling, they got the response, 'Oh, we love Jill but, come on, this is Kweisi.'' What's less clear is whether Mfume's reputation in Baltimore, burnished over 45 years in the public eye, makes him the man for the moment as far as his contemporary House colleagues are concerned. He's not known as a partisan brawler, and he said in the interview he doesn't intend to become one. 'There are always going to be fights and disagreements,' he said. 'It's kind of escalated in the last few years to a level that we haven't seen before. I think the main thing is to moderate and to manage the disagreements, because you're not going to cause any of them to go away. How you manage them and how they are perceived by the overall public is what makes a difference.' Mfume is leaning heavily, in fact, on the style and reputation of the man who filled the 7th District seat for the 24 years in between his House stints — the late Rep. Elijah Cummings, who served as top Democrat and then chair of Oversight during Trump's first term and is still spoken of in reverent terms inside the caucus. Mfume concedes that Cummings might have been the better communicator — he 'had a little more preacher in him than I do' — but said they share a similar lofty approach to politics. Like Cummings, he suggested prescription drug prices might be a committee priority. What Mfume is unlikely to have is the official support of the Congressional Black Caucus, a powerful force in intracaucus politics. With two members in the race — Crockett also belongs — Mfume said he does not expect a formal CBC endorsement after an interview process Wednesday. But he still expected to draw support from the bloc — especially its more senior members. Other factors complicate Mfume's candidacy. One is age: He is a year older than Connolly was when he was elected to lead Oversight Democrats last year. For those who prize seniority, Lynch has actually spent more time on the panel. And his 2004 departure from the NAACP was marred by controversy: The Baltimore Sun reported the executive committee of the group voted not to extend his contract under threat of a sexual harassment lawsuit; the NAACP later paid the woman who complained a $100,000 settlement. Mfume strenuously denied any wrongdoing, but while the episode has not emerged as a major issue in the Oversight race, some Democrats have privately expressed reservations about elevating a leader with personal baggage to potentially lead investigations of Trump. 'There's never been one person to corroborate that one allegation — not one,' Mfume said. About the payment, he said, 'I found out about it, quite frankly, after it happened.' Much of the Democratic Caucus remains undecided ahead of the June 24 secret-ballot vote. Candidates will first go before Democrats' Steering and Policy Committee, which will make a recommendation to the full caucus. 'I think that you have a situation where Mfume and Steve Lynch are getting support from folks who put seniority at top, and maybe the other two candidates would probably lean toward members who are newer, and then you got a whole host of folks that's in the middle. And I think that's where the battle is to see where they fall,' said Rep. Greg Meeks (D-N.Y.). One younger member said he was swayed by Mfume's experience. Rep. Ro Khanna (D-Calif.), who is 48 and had weighed his own bid, said that while other candidates were compelling, the Baltimorean had a 'leg up.' 'Kweisi shows me pictures of him with Nelson Mandela,' he said. 'I was like, I'm not going to run against Nelson Mandela's best friend.'
New York Times
11 minutes ago
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Texas Governor Will Deploy National Guard to Immigration Protests
Gov. Greg Abbott of Texas said late Tuesday that he would deploy National Guard troops across the state, making him the first governor to do so as protests against the Trump administration's immigration crackdown spread across the United States. Mr. Abbott, a Republican and a vocal supporter of President Trump's immigration agenda, said on social media that he would not tolerate violence as protests are planned in San Antonio on Wednesday. The protests that began in Los Angeles last Friday against federal immigration raids have spread to more than a dozen U.S. cities, including Dallas, Austin, Houston and San Antonio. While many of the protests have been peaceful, police have clashed with demonstrators at some of them. Mr. Trump has threatened to override governors who don't want to send National Guard troops to stop protests, like the president did in California, where he sent nearly 5,000 National Guard troops and Marines over the strong objections of state leaders. That has made California ground zero for Mr. Trump's immigration agenda, which includes ramping up deportations of undocumented immigrants with the help of local law enforcement agencies and, in a rare action, active-duty military forces. Mr. Abbott's announcement said that the Texas National Guard will 'use every tool & strategy to help law enforcement maintain order.' 'Peaceful protest is legal,' he added. 'Harming a person or property is illegal & will lead to arrest.' The announcement did not specify where and when the troops will be deployed. Mr. Abbott's office, the San Antonio Police Department, the Texas National Guard and U.S. Northern Command did not immediately respond to requests for comment. On Monday night, more than a dozen protesters were arrested in Austin during a demonstration at the Texas Capitol in Austin, Mr. Abbott had said. Law enforcement officials used tear gas and pepper ball projectiles, the Texas Department of Public Safety said.
