The attorney general has some explaining to do. Will anyone make him?

A recap of the eighth week of the Florida Legislature's 2025 session, plus a preview of week nine.

Source: The Florida Channel

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As reporters and lawmakers have dug deeper into the Hope Florida Foundation — the charity that the DeSantis administration seems to have used to turn $10 million of public money into cash for political campaign ads — there is one name that keeps coming up:

James Uthmeier.

Uthmeier — who was Ron DeSantis’ chief of staff and is now the DeSantis-appointed attorney general of Florida — appears at both the beginning and the end of this scandal.

To summarize: The DeSantis administration had a Medicaid contractor make a $10 million “donation” to the Hope Florida Foundation, a charity founded by the governor’s wife, First Lady Casey DeSantis. It was part of a $67 million legal settlement with Centene Corp., the state’s largest Medicaid contractor, after the company overbilled the state for prescription drugs.

The Hope Florida Foundation immediately gave that $10 million to a pair of dark-money nonprofits — including one controlled by executives at the Florida Chamber of Commerce, the Big Business lobbying group that works closely with the Governor’s Office.

Those two nonprofits then rolled a combined $8.5 million into “Keep Florida Clean,” a political committee — controlled by Uthmeier — that had been set up last year to help Ron DeSantis campaign against a proposed constitutional amendment that would have legalized marijuana.

The political committee helped pay for television advertising against the marijuana ballot measure, in a campaign that DeSantis viewed as critical to his political future.

The Tampa Bay Times and Miami Herald reported last week that Centene Corp., the contractor that overbilled the Florida’s Medicaid health insurance program, presented the DeSantis administration with a draft settlement — for the same $67 million that Florida eventually agreed to — back in February 2022.

That same month, Uthmeier had a “Centene call” scheduled with the outside attorneys Florida had hired to help with the overbilling claims against Centene, according to calendar entries initially obtained by American Oversight, a transparency watchdog group that has fought to wrest public records out of the DeSantis administration.

The attorneys on the call included Paul Hurst, a chief of staff to former Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour, and Matthew McDonald, an attorney at a major Mississippi firm. Both were part of a legal team helping states across the country pursue claims against Centene.

Uthmeier's calendar entries show that he continued to meet with and about Centene throughout 2022, as the two sides engaged in settlement talks.

For instance, his calendar also shows a “Centene meeting” in August 2022 with reps from the company — including Centene’s general counsel and an outside attorney from Locke Lord, the law firm Centene retained to represent the company in the Medicaid overbilling litigation.

The DeSantis administration appears to have cut off the settlement talks with Centene in late 2022 or early 2023, for some reason. The administration released a letter last week that Centene sent in February 2023 in which company lawyers wrote that “it has been several months since we received any communication from Florida related to the proposed PBM settlement.”

It’s not yet clear why the talks went cold, although early 2023 is when Ron DeSantis launched his campaign for president.

The presidential bid consumed the governor and his team for a year — Uthmeier even stepped down as chief of staff from August 2023 to January 2024 to become DeSantis’ campaign manager. Lots of DeSantis’ work in Florida slowed down as he plodded across Iowa in his failed bid to dethrone Donald Trump.

Whatever caused the delay, Florida finally agreed to Centene’s $67 million settlement offer in September 2024.

But there was a new wrinkle: Instead of returning the full $67 million to the state treasury — which would have triggered strict rules about how it could be spent — the DeSantis administration directed Centene to give $10 million of the settlement money directly to the Hope Florida Foundation.

The settlement was signed by Centene’s general counsel and required a copy be sent to partners at Locke Lord — the same folks Uthmeier was meeting with back in 2022.

Shortly after Hope Florida Foundation got the $10 million from Centene, the charity received two $5 million "grant requests."

One of those $5 million requests came from "Secure Florida’s Future," a nonprofit that Florida Chamber of Commerce executives use as a source of untraceable campaign cash.

The other came from “Save Our Society From Drugs,” an anti-marijuana advocacy group that tax records show had raised only about $60,000 the previous year.

Both organizations were already large donors to Keep Florida Clean — the political committee opposing the marijuana amendment that was controlled by Uthmeier.

And who instructed Secure Florida’s Future and Save Our Society From Drugs to ask for $5 million each from the Hope Florida Foundation?

James Uthmeier.

That’s according to state Rep. Alex Andrade, the Pensacola Republican who has presided over hearings into Hope Florida and who personally questioned the leaders of Secure Florida’s Future and Save Our Society From Drugs. (The executive director of the drug group later claimed Andrade had misquoted her on some details — but not that one.)

Source: Miami Herald

Now, there are a few important questions that remain unanswered. Probably the most important: Who came up with the scheme to divert $10 million of Medicaid settlement money to the Hope Florida Foundation — and who ultimately approved it?

Uthmeier, who DeSantis elevated to attorney general in February, insists he had nothing to do with the decision.

But he and his defenders keep moving the goalposts on this particular point. After initially implying that Uthmeier wasn’t involved in the Centene settlement negotiations at all, his team now says he wasn’t involved in the settlement negotiations in 2024.

Frankly, it strains credulity to think that Ron DeSantis’ right-hand man would have remained completely hands-off in such a sensitive decision — a decision that, remember, involved funneling $10 million from a high-profile legal settlement through a charity that was personally important to the governor’s wife.

And Uthmeier was a hands-on chief of staff. Records show he has been involved in everything from the DeSantis administration’s bid to build a golf course in a beloved state park to the sugar industry’s attempt to open a rock mine in the Everglades.

But the truth is that we still don’t yet know for certain who orchestrated this scheme.

And, suddenly, it seems like we might never know.

That’s because the Florida House of Representatives abruptly ended its Hope Florida hearings last week. Andrade told reporters that lawmakers had obtained all the information they needed — even though they had just been spurned by a trio of key witnesses who all refused to testify before Andrade’s committee and answer questions under oath.

The lawmaker — who once said he would subpoena Uthmeier directly — ultimately concluded the hearings without issuing any subpoenas at all.

It’s possible that answers will come from other sources. Andrade also told reporters he had discussed the events with people in the U.S. Department of Justice, although it’s hard to know whether that’s anything more than bluster at this point.

And House Speaker Danny Perez (R-Miami) later told reporters that his chamber may pick up its Hope Florida probe in some other form later, if and when lawmakers receive records they have requested from the DeSantis administration.

“We don’t have all the facts yet,” Perez said. “At this point, all options are still on the table with Hope Florida. We have not closed the door on that. I think there is still more information to find out.”

To be very clear: The House has not done enough yet.

Sure, if the goal here was simply to slime DeSantis and his inner circle — and maybe muddy up Uthmeier’s bid for re-election or a long-rumored Casey DeSantis campaign for governor — then mission accomplished, I guess.

But if this was a sincere attempt to find answers on behalf of Florida taxpayers — and demand accountability from people entrusted with positions of great power who abuse their offices — then there is still a lot of work left to do.

Billtrack

In honor of the best show on TV, here’s a look at some of the bills on the move from the past week of session:

• House Bill 1219: Enables businesses to bind some workers to longer non-compete contracts. Passed the House of Representatives by a 91-21 vote. (See votes) Passed the Senate by a 28-9 vote. (See votes) Goes to the governor.

• Senate Bill 140: Allows a traditional public school to be converted into a charter school without the consent of the teachers who work at the school. Passed the Senate by a 30-7 vote. (See votes)

• Senate Bill 498: Lets banks pay lower interest rates on bank accounts that are used to fund legal services for the poor. Passed the Senate by a 28-10 vote. (See votes)

• Senate Bill 820: Establishes a governor-controlled “Office of Faith and Community” to coordinate activities between state agencies and churches. Passed the Senate by a 27-9 vote. (See votes)

• Senate Bill 832: Gives mining giant Mosaic Co. protection from lawsuits against lawsuits over radioactive contamination on former mine lands – but also gives homeowners more leverage when they sue an insurance company that fails to fully pay a claim. Passed the House of Representatives by an 80-20 vote. (See votes)

• House Bill 1225: Allows businesses to put high school students on full-time work schedules and speeds up the implementation of a state law that will eliminate all local “living wage” ordinances enacted by cities and counties. Passed the House of Representatives by a 78-30 vote. (See votes)

• House Bill 1255: Requires school districts to show sixth-graders computer-generated videos of fetuses like “Baby Olivia,” a video produced by an anti-abortion activist group. Passed the House of Representatives by an 86-27 vote. (See votes)

• House Bill 1267: Greatly expands the number of communities in which a charter school operator can open a “School of Hope” and allows them to co-locate in public-school buildings free of charge. Passed the House of Representatives by an 86-27 vote. (See votes)

• House Bill 7033: A roughly $5.5 billion package of consumer tax cuts and special-interest tax breaks. Passed the House of Representatives by a 78-29 vote. (See votes)

Looking ahead

Florida lawmakers will spend much of what is supposed to be the final week of the 2025 legislative session in day-long floor sessions in which the House and Senate will bounce bills back and forth between the two chambers — unless and until they agree on finished products that they then send on to the governor to sign or veto. So for our final (hopefully) weekly preview of this year’s session, here are a few interesting areas and bills to follow over the final few days and hours.

Land use and development

There are at least two particularly important development bills to watch this week.

The first is House Bill 579, which House leaders suddenly and dramatically expanded last week. The revamped package includes language initially written by lobbyists for Lennar Corp. that would enable developers of master-planned communities to squeeze never-ending profits out of homebuyers. It also includes a provision intended to help Rayonier Advanced Materials crush local opposition standing in the way of an ethanol plant the company wants to build in Fernandina Beach.

House Bill 579 also has an exceptionally broad title: “An act relating to land use and development.” That make the legislation an inviting target for last-minute floor amendments, which must be related to the subject of the bill to which they are attached.

The second bill to watch is Senate Bill 492, which began as a narrow bill dealing with mitigation banks but which the Senate cryptically retitled last week as an “Act relating to land development.” That makes it, too, a likely landing spot for eleventh-hour amendments sprung by legislators and lobbyists hoping to avoid public scrutiny.

Also keep an eye on Senate Bill 1080, which, as currently written, would make it easier for homebuilders to build subdivisions on farmland around cities. A bipartisan group of senators rejected the bill last week on a dramatic 19-18 vote. But it was revived the very next day through a procedural maneuver, and the Senate could revisit it again at any time.

Worker’s rights

Early Friday evening, the House of Representatives passed House Bill 1225, a controversial bill that would roll back the state’s child labor laws and let business put high school students on the same kind of full-time schedules as working adults.

The legislation — which has been pushed behind the scenes by a billionaire-backed think tank and Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis — would seem to be dead on arrival in the Senate, where similar legislation has been stalled for weeks amid bipartisan opposition.

This, however, is yet another bill that has been mysteriously expanded beyond its original scope. House Bill 1225 now includes a second provision that would speed up plans to dissolve “living wage” ordinances adopted by several cities and counties across Florida.

On the final day of last year’s legislative session, Republicans in the Legislature passed a bill to eliminate all living wage ordinances starting in October 2026. House Bill 1225 would move the execution date up to October 2025.

But the change also turned House Bill 1225 from “an act relating to the employment of minors” into “an act relating to employment.”

That’s an almost limitless title. And it has transformed the legislation into a potential vehicle for any number of anti-worker changes that lawmakers could suddenly pluck from the wish lists of Big Business lobbying groups like the Florida Chamber of Commerce.

Tax breaks

Florida lawmakers haven’t been able to finish a new state budget yet in large part because the two chambers have proposed wildly different packages tax cuts.

The House plan (House Bill 7033) would slash taxes by an unprecedented $5.5 billion a year, primarily by cutting the statewide sales tax rate from 6 percent to 5.25 percent. The Senate plan (Senate Bill 7034) is much narrower: It would cut taxes by about $1 billion a year, mostly by eliminating sales tax on clothing and shoes priced $75 or less.

But both tax packages are also larded up with special-interest giveaways. The Senate, for instance, wants to create a $35 million tax credit program that records show was written by lobbyists for Advantage Capital — an investment company with a long history of selling state lawmakers on incentive programs that lose money for taxpayers but make money for Advantage Capital.

The House plan, meanwhile, would hand tax breaks to airlines, poker rooms, and a Christian group that funds anti-abortion and anti-LGBTQ+ activism, while also stuffing cash subsidies into the horse tracks and gambling operations at Gulfstream Park in South Florida and Tampa Bay Downs.

And more tax giveaways could surface in the closing days of session.

One corporate tax break drafted in secret but not yet added to legislation would save tens of millions of dollars for Verizon Communications.

Other ideas floating around as potential amendments include sales tax breaks on NASCAR race tickets; purchases made by host committees to promote sporting events like Super Bowls and World Cup matches; and “smart water shutoff devices” installed in homes. (See also: Lennar Expands Smart Water Technology to More Homes).

Meanwhile, Philip Morris International has been lobbying lawmakers to exempt its “IQOS” heated tobacco products from state taxes. The Big Tobacco company’s bills (House Bill 785 and Senate Bill 1418) seem to have stalled in both chambers — which could be because Ron DeSantis decided to gift Philip Morris its tax break all by himself. But the issue could also reappear in a final tax package, too.

One caveat: Lawmakers can’t make any final decisions on individual tax breaks until they resolve their broader budget differences — and that may not happen this week.

Constitutional amendments

It’s been obvious since last fall — when constitutional amendments to end a statewide abortion ban and legalize marijuana fell just short of the 60 percent supermajority needed to pass — that Republican leaders in Tallahassee would try this session to crush future ballot petition drives.

The fight over the ballot access in Florida has been the most important policy battle since Day One. And it remains the most important policy battle heading into the final week.

The House and Senate have both passed proposals that would place more hurdles and red tape in front of citizen-led constitutional amendments — and then hit any group that trips over any of these new obstacles with potentially ruinous financial penalties.

But the bills aren’t yet identical. Senate Bill 7016, for instance, goes further in imposing regulations on people who simply volunteer to collect petitions. House Bill 1205, meanwhile, would punish the state’s chief economist after she refused to go along with a partisan plan to write a misleading ballot statement for last year’s abortion-rights amendment.

Republican leaders in the House and Senate will have to resolve those differences and more before they can pass a final bill on the governor.

Reading list

• Lawmakers end Hope Florida charity probe without hearing from key players (Tampa Bay Times) ($)

• The $10M steered to Hope Florida by the state was Medicaid money, document shows (Miami Herald) ($)

• Orlando attorney caught up in DeSantis’ Hope Florida fiasco is on the state payroll (Orlando Weekly)

• Florida springs restoration bill has largely unspoken connection to utilities, but advocates are giving it a thumbs up (Creative Loafing)

• Florida pushed anti-abortion nonprofit to run ads against Amendment 4 (Tampa Bay Times) ($)

• Amid AHCA scandal, Medicaid accountability bill heads to Senate floor (Florida Phoenix)

• Florida Senate panel rejects push to weaken state park golf ban (Tampa Bay Times) ($)

• Did Florida attorney general cross a line telling cops they can ignore a court order? (Miami Herald) ($)