DeSantis Looks to Keep Abortion Rights, Marijuana Scores Below 60%

On November 1, 2024By Littum

The governor’s political future is also tied, at least in part, to keeping the proposals below the 60% each must pass.

John Kennedy
| Capital Bureau | USA TODAY NETWORK – FLORIDA

Governor Ron DeSantis is spending the campaign focusing almost exclusively on two of them most expensive voting campaigns in the nation, throwing millions of dollars in taxpayer money and a barrage of dubious claims against legalizing marijuana and restoring abortion rights in Florida.

Groups that spend on Amendment 3, which would allow recreational marijuana, and Amendment 4, expanding access to abortion, have raised more than $225 million over the past two years, placing them at the top of more than 150 ballot proposals going before American voters on November 5.

TV, radio and digital platforms are ablaze with advertising during the closing hours of the campaign. The governor and first lady Casey DeSantis are key players in the campaign playoffs, appearing daily over the past few weeks to reject Amendments 3 and 4.

The governor’s political future is also tied, at least in part, to keeping the proposals below the 60% level of support each must pass. If the measures pass, DeSantis’ influence could take a hit heading into his final two years as Florida’s leader. He has a limited term and leaves office in January 2027.

DeSantis defies Trump on marijuana

Former President Donald Trump has supported the marijuana initiative that DeSantis is now trying to defeat. DeSantis is also drawing heat for his pooling of state resources to kill both measures, which only made the ballot after collecting about 1 million signatures from Floridians.

“No matter where you stand on this issue, this is still a democracy, and in a democracy we don’t spend taxpayer dollars ahead of a political issue,” said Republican state Sen. Joe Gruters of Sarasota, a former chairman of the Florida Republican Party. who support Trump.

Gruters said he opposes the abortion rights measure, but derided DeSantis’ amendment spending as “propaganda.”

The Amendment 3 campaign estimates that $50 million in taxpayer money has been spent by the governor against the measure, paying for 13,000 TV spots, 5,000 radio ads and more. The campaign said the public money going to DeSantis’ anti-abortion rights efforts undoubtedly tops that figure.

According to analysis by OpenSecrets, the nonprofit money-tracking website, the marijuana amendment has drawn $125 million on both sides, with $93 million from Trulieve, the pot industry giant backing it. It is the most expensive ballot in the country.

Florida’s Amendment 4 supporters have contributed $110 million, far more than the $10 million opponents raised. That could make it the nation’s second-most expensive proposal to go before voters, according to OpenSecrets’ data.

But campaign spending reports are a snapshot in time, especially so close to Election Day when the dollars are still flowing.

The DeSantis administration is unfazed by criticism

Yet the DeSantis administration is unfazed by criticism for directing taxpayer dollars toward issues that many of those same taxpayers helped put on the ballot.

“Critics say it’s inappropriate, it’s unusual to do that. I would say it’s a responsibility the state has to educate individuals to know what they’re voting for,” Lt. Gov. Jeanette Nunez said during a recent performance in Clearwater.

The governor has spent virtually no time campaigning for Trump, U.S. Sen. Rick Scott or other Florida Republicans on the ballot. Instead, DeSantis has been traveling the state, for example, with doctors who oppose Amendment 4, claiming a host of flaws.

The measure would repeal the state law banning most abortions after six weeks of pregnancy, which DeSantis pushed through a compliant Republican-controlled legislature. If approved by voters, Amendment 4 intends to bring the roughly 24-week standard that was in place in Florida for nearly five decades before the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade in 2022.

But DeSantis says Amendment 4 lacks definitions — even though a majority of the Florida Supreme Court upheld the ballot language. He also says it will allow abortion at any time for any reason. That is misleading since Florida law defines fetal viability.

DeSantis further warns that any healthcare professional could perform abortions if the measure passes, although Florida law separately requires doctors to perform the procedure.

While clouding what Amendment 4 would allow, DeSantis has been firm about whether the measure should even be on the ballot. His State Department, which oversees state elections, recently released a 348-page “preliminary” report alleging fraudulent signatures helped vault the proposal onto the ballot while petition-raisers were paid illegally per signature.

DeSantis’ efforts have echoes of electoral denial

With the report’s release clearly designed to undermine support for the abortion measure, some critics heard echoes of Trump’s election rejections, which the Republican presidential nominee is once again ratcheting up with unsubstantiated allegations of voter fraud in the battleground state of Pennsylvania.

DeSantis’ fight against Amendment 3 involves claims that pot smoking will be widespread and public throughout Florida. However, the governor fails to note that state smoking laws already impose some restrictions and that the Amendment 3 campaign supports the Legislature imposing more limits if the measure passes.

“We’ve seen more and more campaigning with over-the-top claims, provably false claims or outright lies,” said Aubrey Jewett, a political scientist at the University of Central Florida. “It seems to be more and more standard operating procedure.”

Jewett said DeSantis appears to have embraced Trump’s tactics, which crushed his bid for the Republican presidential nomination but which DeSantis supported afterward.

DeSantis “is willing to push the boundaries of what is legal and push past the norms that have kind of existed in Florida politics and American politics,” Jewett said.

“He has said he will use every power a governor has to push his agenda to the limit. And he has. Using state resources to fight these two ballot measures is just the latest example,” he added .

Claims that Amendment 4 is on the ballot fraudulently fit this Trump-like pattern, voting rights advocates say. The signatures were verified by election supervisors and the measure was certified for the ballot by Secretary of State Cord Byrd, a DeSantis appointee, in January.

“Undermining election integrity seems to be part of the GOP playbook,” said Brad Ashwell, Florida director of All Voting is Local, a nonpartisan, national voting rights organization. “The common themes we see are complaints that non-citizens are voting, that there are people on the roll who shouldn’t be there, and that vote counting machines aren’t trustworthy or are being hacked in some way.

“It appears to be a coordinated message from the top down,” he added.

John Kennedy is a reporter in the USA TODAY Network’s Florida Capital Bureau. He can be found at [email protected]or on X at @JKennedyReport.