What to watch as Florida's 2025 session begins

Undermining workers and weakening social safety nets. Corporate favors for car dealers, mining companies, and cattle ranchers. And looming battles over ballot initiatives and abortion bans.

Photo credit: Michael Rivera

This is Seeking Rents, a newsletter and podcast devoted to producing original journalism — and lifting up the work of others — about Florida politics, with an emphasis on the ways that big businesses and other special interests influence public policy in the state. Seeking Rents is produced by veteran investigative journalist Jason Garcia, and it is free to all. But please consider a voluntary paid subscription, if you can afford one, to help support our work. And check out our video channel, too.

Florida lawmakers will gavel open the 2025 legislative session tomorrow morning, kicking off a 60-day dash in which they will debate hundreds of bills and spend billions of dollars.

There will be a bunch of policy fights over the next two months in Tallahassee. But only a select few will get much attention — mostly those that pit the Legislature’s Republican leadership against a weakened Gov. Ron DeSantis or that connect to national politics and President Donald Trump.

But before it all begins, I wanted to share some of the issues that I’ll be following most closely this session, both in our newsletter and on our podcast.

My list is, admittedly, a bit of a hodgepodge. It includes legislation to undermine workers and weaken social safety nets. Corporate favors for car dealers, mining companies, and cattle ranchers. And looming battles over ballot initiatives and abortion bans.

But there’s also some more unusual stuff — including what sure looks like an attempt to screw over kids in Delaware.

Two notes before we begin. First, I’ll be diving more deeply into many of these issues over the weeks to come. And second, if there are other issues you think I should be paying attention to or lifting up this session, please don’t hesitate to email me at Garcia.JasonR@gmail.com.

With that out of the way, here’s the list:

Saving car dealers from competition

House Bill 429 and Senate Bill 1820

It’s obviously far too early to declare The Worst Bill of the Session™, but these two bills are the early leaders in the clubhouse, as far as I’m concerned. They are yet another attempt by anti-competitive car dealers and faux-free-market legislators to make sure Floridians keep paying higher-than-necessary prices for new cars by forcing them buy through middleman dealerships rather than directly from manufacturers.

The Senate bill — sponsored by Sen. Tom Leek (R-Ormond Beach) — is especially noxious, as it appears specifically written to shut down Scout Motors, a Volkswagen-backed startup that has begun taking reservation deposits on a line of electric SUVs and pickup tracks it plans to begin selling in 2027.

Furter reading: Car dealers try to keep a chokehold on new car sales in Florida (Seeking Rents)

Shutting down direct democracy

House Bill 1205 and Senate Bill 1414

As obnoxious as the car-dealer legislation is — and it’s about as raw an example of rent-seeking as you’ll find in Tallahassee — it’s obviously not the most important issue Florida lawmakers will take on this session. What is? I would argue it’s the coming war on ballot initiatives.

There’s going to be a big push in Tallahassee this session to shut down any future citizen-led constitutional amendments, after an election in which Florida voters nearly passed measures that would have overturned the state abortion ban and legalized marijuana.

While it’s too soon to know exactly what lawmakers will do, House Bill 1205 has been fast-tracked by House Speaker Danny Perez (R-Miami). The bill would impose new restrictions on who can collect signatures, cut the amount of time campaigns have to turn in petitions, and dramatically increase the financial and legal exposure for ballot sponsors who trip over intentional obstacles and red tape.

Meanwhile, Senate Bill 1414, sponsored by Sen. Blaise Ingoglia (R-Spring Hill), contains many of the demands that Gov. Ron DeSantis made earlier this year that legislative leaders have, at least so far, mostly ignored.

Further reading: Ron DeSantis wants lawmakers to sanction his election interference (Seeking Rents)

Busting unions (again)

House Bill 1387 and Senate Bill 1766, House Bill 1217 and Senate Bill 1328

Two years ago, DeSantis and the Legislature passed an ugly union-busting bill meant to financially destabilize unions representing public employees like school teachers, city clerks, utility line workers, and bus drivers, among many others.

Now, the same billionaire-backed, anti-worker groups that pushed Senate Bill 256 through Tallahassee in 2023 want lawmakers to tighten the screws on public workers. This quartet of bills would make it even harder to create or maintain a union by imposing new restrictions on organizing activities and raising the threshold to win unionization votes.

Locking down workers

House Bill 1219 and Senate Bill 922

Ever wonder why Silicon Valley emerged as the nation’s tech startup center? Well, some researchers argue it’s because the state of California has for years restricted the use of non-compete agreements, ensuring that workers could move freely between companies — and start their own.

The Florida Legislature may go the other way. House Bill 1219 and Senate Bill 922 would give corporations far more power to bind certain employees to non-compete agreements — turning them into iron chains that shackle workers to their current employer.

Shredding a safety net

House Bill 1157 and Senate Bill 1238

With help from both Rick Scott and Ron DeSantis, Florida’s Big Business and billionaire lobbies have spent almost 15 years now systematically hollowing out the state’s unemployment insurance system — cutting benefits, imposing barriers, and building a designed-to-fail filing system that is notoriously difficult to use.

Now, they want Florida lawmakers to go even further and invent new reasons to deny claims. The House bill, which is very similar to legislation that failed to pass a year ago, is ripped straight out of the Foundation for Government Accountability playbook. The Senate bill is more subtle — but arguably even more dangerous for workers.

Further reading: Prodded by business lobbyists, lawmakers may cut more Floridians off from unemployment insurance (Seeking Rents)

Cutting progress off at the pass

House Bill 1193 and Senate Bill 1772

Communities around the country have been begun testing guaranteed income programs — programs that provide consistent, no-strings-attached cash payments to specific populations in need, like families living in poverty or new mothers. They’ve shown promising results, enabling recipients to find more stable jobs, move to better neighborhoods, and even to get out of violent relationships.

So naturally some Florida lawmakers want to shut the movement down — via bills that would bar local communities from making payments to anybody through a guaranteed income program.

Further reading: The Florida Legislature is back. So are the billionaires who expect lawmakers to do their bidding. (Seeking Rents)

Fintech payday loans

House Bill 1391 and Senate Bill 422

Lobbyists for the fintech industry have fanned out to state Capitols across the country, hoping to persuade lawmakers to support a new generation of cash-advance apps that the industry calls “earned wage access” — but which ultimately function like a new generation of payday loans.

The industry wants to make sure that its products are exempt from lending laws — and the consumer protections that come with them, like interest rate caps. And they want the freedom to charge opaque, hard-to-avoid, and often-misleading fees.

These bills first surfaced in Florida last year — written, records show, by lobbyists for DailyPay and EarnIn. They didn’t move then, but they’re back again this year.

Further reading: Florida politicians may unleash the next generation of payday lenders (Seeking Rents)

Bank profits vs. Legal Aid

House Bill 173 and Senate Bill 498

There aren’t many programs more impactful than Legal Aid, which provides civil attorneys for lower-income folks and families facing cases of life-changing consequences: Battered spouses attempting to divorce abusive partners and maintain custody of their children; disabled veterans trying to get the benefits they are owed; families about to have their homes seized by a bank.

And yet Florida is one of just four states that refuses to fund Legal Aid directly. Instead, Legal Aid is funded through a program overseen by the Florida Supreme Court, using interest earned on certain types of bank accounts maintained by law firms.

But some of the banks that hold these accounts want to make more profit off them. So they’re lobbying for bills that would cut the interest rates they have to pay — and, in doing so, cut funding for Legal Aid.

Further reading: Banks lobbyists want to slash funding for legal support programs (Seeking Rents)

Big Ag’s bidding

House Bill 651 and Senate Bill 700

Just a year ago, Wilton Simpson — the former president of the Florida Senate who is now the state’s commissioner of agriculture — lobbied a bill through the Legislature intended to save the cattle industry and other meat producers from having to compete with new companies starting to grow meat in a lab.

Now, Simpson is back for another round of rent-seeking on behalf of both the meat and dairy industries. He’s pushing legislation that would forbid companies that make plant-based meat and milk — think Beyond Beef or oat milk — from using terms like “beef” or “milk” on their labels. It’s part of a national campaign orchestrated by Big Ag lobbyists in other states and Washington.

Further reading: Milking the system: The dairy industry takes more of your money by erecting barriers to competition. Got rent-seeking? (Washington Post)

Rural profiteers

House Bill 837 and Senate Bill 1322

The new president of the Florida Senate — Sen. Ben Albritton, a Republican from the tiny town of Wauchula — says that one of his top priorities is helping improve the quality of life in the forgotten corners of Florida. He’s pushing a sweeping “rural renaissance” package focused on issues like expanded access to education, healthcare and technology.

One thing to watch out for, though, will be special interests trying to sneak their own self-interested issues through under the guise of helping rural communities.

A potential example: The “Florida Rural Jobs Act,” a piece of legislation that would create a tax credit program ostensibly to spur investments in rural areas. It’s being pushed by lobbyists for Advantage Capital, a company with a long history of persuading state Legislatures — including Florida’s — to pass complex tax incentive programs that it claims will help struggling communities but that critics say ultimately enrich the company.

Further reading: Investment company writes Florida incentive laws, then profits from them (Orlando Sentinel)

Banning the bans

House Bill 1001 and Senate Bill 1388

A brand new bill this session is the “Watercraft Energy Source Freedom Act.” That’s what supporters are branding legislation that would forbid local communities in Florida from restricting the sale of watercraft based on the type of fuel they use.

It look like an extension of a nationwide lobbying effort to preempt cities and counties across the country from trying to restrict the sales of combustible-engine cars. This “ban the bans” campaign has been led publicly, at least in part, by a group called the “Specialty Equipment Marketing Association,” whose members include Toyota and Yamaha — two companies that have invested heavily in hydrogen engines and lobbied to stop policies they fear would favor electric vehicles.

Records show that lobbyists for Yamaha — which makes outboard motors for boats and jet skis — have registered on the new Florida legislation.

Who cares about Delaware kids?

House Bill 1173 and Senate Bill 806

These are the type of bills that put some people to sleep. They deal with state trust law and questions of “qualified beneficiaries” and legal standing.

But hidden behind this arcane legalese is something that could end up cutting needy kids in Delaware out of their share of a fortune left behind by Alfred duPont, a member of the duPont family dynasty

Stay with me here and I’ll try to keep this short: duPont — who lived much of his life in Delaware but later moved to Jacksonville — established a charitable trust to fund care for sick children and elderly people. The trust funds Nemours, the chain of nonprofit pediatric hospitals.

The Alfred I. duPont Charitable Trust was set up in Florida. But its governing documents require the charity to prioritize help for the residents of Delaware. And that has led to a series of legal disputes over the years about whether the duPont trust is inappropriately diverting money to activities in other states — like Florida, where Nemours has facilities in Jacksonville, Orlando, and Pensacola.

The disputes include a recent case brought by the attorney general of Delaware. The duPont trust tried to have the case dismissed by arguing that Delaware’s top lawyer wasn’t allowed to file such a suit under Florida law. But a Florida appellate court ruled last year that the Delaware attorney general does, in fact, have standing to sue the duPont trust and enforce the rights of the kids of Delaware.

These new Florida bills would overturn that decision — prohibiting Delaware’s AG from filing any future suits if the duPont Trust and Nemours fail their obligations to Delaware kids.

Reinforcing Florida’s abortion ban

House Bill 1517 and Senate Bill 1284

More than 57 percent of Florida voters cast ballots last fall in support of measure that would have overturned the state’s near-total abortion ban. That was just short of the 60 percent supermajority needed to pass constitutional amendments in Florida.

Now, Florida’s gerrymandered Legislature may try to lock that ban down.

That’s one of the downstream impacts from these bills, which are meant to cement a concept known as “fetal personhood” into state law.

The legislation would allow wrongful death lawsuits on behalf of an embryo or fetus in the event of an accident that ends a pregnancy. But beyond that, the legislation could serve to tee up a case for Florida’s conservative Supreme Court to declare that a fetus is a “person” under the state constitution — something most of the court’s justices have signaled they want to do.

And that could effectively thwart any future attempts to roll back anti-abortion laws in Florida.

Forcing teenagers to have babies

House Bill 1505 and Senate Bill 1288

Florida Republicans may also find a way to expand the state abortion ban, too.

Though it’s not explicitly spelled out in this legislation, House Bill 1505 and Senate Bill 1288 could effectively prevent teenagers in dangerous family situations from going to court for a waiver from a state law that requires minor to get consent from a parent before they can get an abortion.

It’s one of those bills that could come down to how Florida judges choose to interpret it — and some high-ranking Florida judges have already written that they think Florida should do away with judicial waivers entirely.

A lawsuit shield for Mosaic

House Bill 585 and Senate Bill 832

The Mosaic Co., the Fortune 500 industrial giant that mines phosphate rock and turns it into fertilizer, is one of the biggest and most politically influential corporations in Florida politics. And Florida lawmakers may be about to do the company a big favor, by passing a law that would extend new legal protections to companies that mine for phosphate — and leave radioactive material behind, buried just below the surface.

Mosaic is currently fighting a lawsuit over that very issue. But this legislation would reverberate far beyond that one suit in a state with more than 450,000 acres of current and former phosphate mine.

This bill may be on a fast-track, too: The House of Representatives is set to start moving forward with it on day one of session.

Further reading: Florida lawmakers may help a mining giant fend off lawsuits (Seeking Rents)

Watering down the minimum wage

House Bill 541 and Senate Bill 676

There are few things Florida Republican legislators seem to hate more than the minimum wage.

Two years ago, you may recall, Gov. Ron DeSantis and lawmakers passed a bill written by lobbyists for Major League Baseball’s billionaire team owners that cut minor league baseball players out of the state minimum wage.

Now, these bills would allow companies to pay subminimum wages to apprentices, interns and others employees in “work-based learning arrangements.”

Boosters are calling an “opt-out’ because the employee would have to agree to work for less than the minimum wage — as if an intern has the leverage to say no.

Gig worker “benefits”

House Bill 1067 and Senate Bill 1130

A lobbying alliance that spans from ride-hail and food-delivery giants like Uber and Doordash to libertarian think tanks like the Mercatus Center have been pushing lawmakers across the country to allow “portable benefits.” They’re a kind of savings account that people in traditional jobs — gig workers, temps and independent contractors — could carry with them between jobs and use to help pay for benefits like healthcare and retirement plans.

But this is one of those ideas that’s dangerous because it only offers the illusion of helping workers — there’s nothing in the Florida bills, for instance, that would require companies to help fund these accounts or to ensure that workers could afford even a minimum level of benefits.

At the same time, it risks doing real long-term damage to workers by further protecting the growing number of corporations — companies that employ everyone from nurses to janitors to massage therapists — that are avoiding providing benefits themselves by classifying their workers as contractors rather than employees.

Further reading: The ‘Pro-Worker’ Portable Benefits Scam (The American Prospect)