In Florida, GOP lawmakers are wading into Donald Trump's Gulf of America
While Gov. Ron DeSantis was among the first leaders to embrace President Trump's renaming of the Gulf of Mexico to the Gulf of America, Florida Republican lawmakers now are eager to join the partisan chorus.
Three different bills renaming the water body were debuted Tuesday before committees in the House and Senate. Republican supermajorities are expected to pass a law setting the name change for school instructional material, road signs and more before the Legislature adjourns in early May.
'The name is changed. It's now the Gulf of America,' Sen. Joe Gruters, R-Sarasota, told a Senate panel. 'Listen, we want our kids to have the correct names of everything moving forward, and this is just a way to do that.'
The Gruters bill (SB 1058) was the first of the gulf-renaming bills to clear Republican-dominated legislative committees, winning party-line approval in the Senate Governmental Oversight and Accountability panel.
Democrats were against the name change.
'It just bothers me that we're even making this change, that we're wasting our time doing this,' said Sen. Tina Polsky, D-Boca Raton. 'I don't think we have to fall prey to it … I guess it's a philosophical difference.'
Republican lawmakers said they see it as a simple-to-enact, yet powerful bit of symbolism.
The bill by Gruters, a former Trump campaign co-chair for Florida and endorsed by the president for the Florida Cabinet post of chief financial officer, doesn't order sign removal and replacement.
Nor does the bill require school districts to replace immediately school books and maps failing to comply with the president's Jan. 20 executive order that sought to end 400 years of the water body being known as the Gulf of Mexico.
Instead, like the other gulf bills in the House and Senate (HB 575, SB 608) the legislation envisions a gradual adaptation: 'When they purchase new materials, the name would have to be changed,' Gruters said.
Polsky asked, 'What happens when we have a new president who has the sense to bring us back to the Gulf of Mexico? Do the textbooks have to be replaced?'
Basically, yes, Gruters said. But he added that it was necessary to "use the proper name."
The U.S. Department of the Interior says the Gulf of America name was effective for U.S. federal agencies on Jan. 24, although the change did not apply in an international context.
DeSantis was quick to get on board with the president's name change, referring to the Gulf of America within two days of the White House order when issuing his own executive order involving a winter storm.
Earlier this month, DeSantis and the Cabinet followed-up with a resolution directing all state agencies to update maps, records and publications to reflect the new designation. Florida has a 770-mile Gulf coast, so there's likely plenty of material that would need updating under the legislation advancing.
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In the potential financial impact statement that legislation must carry in Florida, analysts declared that state and local governments would face 'insignificant, negative fiscal impact from updating official documents, websites, signage, publications, and other materials.'
But for Florida Republicans, endorsing the president's geography lesson appears to be an important piece of symbolism, although one lawmaker acknowledged it can draw criticism.
'It's great to see that we're being brave to do this stuff when, you know, sometimes we get it from the public,' said Rep. Judson Sapp, R-Green Cove Springs. 'It really is important. It does represent that America's great and it really does tell the world that we believe that.'
But Rep. Dotie Joseph, D-North Miami, was a 'no' vote in a House hearing on the bill. She explained her opposition with a phrase more commonly used in legislative battles over transgender rights.
'I want to point out that the Gulf of Mexico was assigned that name at birth,' Joseph said.
John Kennedy is a reporter in the USA TODAY Network's Florida Capital Bureau. He can be reached at jkennedy2@gannett.com. Follow him on X: @JKennedyReport.
This article originally appeared on Tallahassee Democrat: Florida Republican lawmakers set sail on Gulf of America renaming
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