Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis vetoes bill that would have repealed ‘Free Kill' law
Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis on Thursday morning publicly vetoed a bill that would have repealed Florida's so-called 'Free Kill' law that blocks some families from suing for pain and suffering when they lose a loved one to medical negligence.
The veto comes as a devastating blow to advocates who had fought for the passage of this bill this year.
They'd been fighting for a repeal of the Free Kill law for years. This was the first time it had ever passed the Legislature, and it did so overwhelmingly.
But DeSantis said it would have harmed the state's health care quality.
[DOWNLOAD: Free Action News Jax app for alerts as news breaks]
The carveout, unique to Florida, prevents anyone from suing for pain and suffering when an unmarried person over the age of 25, with no children under the age of 25, dies due to medical negligence.
Supporters of the repeal argue the law creates a two-tiered system of justice that provides no accountability for an entire category of people.
But DeSantis argued the repeal of the carve-out would have led to a flood of new lawsuits that would have increased health care costs and pushed doctors out of the state.
[SIGN UP: Action News Jax Daily Headlines Newsletter]
He said he would have supported the bill if it had capped pain and suffering damages that could be awarded for all cases of medical negligence, but that's a proposal the legislature has rejected for the last two years in a row.
'If this legislation would be enacted, it would lead to higher costs for Floridians. It would lead to less access to care for Floridians. It would make it harder for us to keep, recruit, and maintain physicians in the State of Florida, and we need more as it is now,' DeSantis said.
Coming up on CBS47 and FOX30 Action News Jax at 5, we'll hear from a local mother who has been fighting to repeal the Free Kill carveout since losing her daughter in 2023, for her reaction to the veto and what she plans to do next.
Click here to download the free Action News Jax news and weather apps, click here to download the Action News Jax Now app for your smart TV and click here to stream Action News Jax live.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Yahoo
an hour ago
- Yahoo
‘He fumbled this 1,000%': How Ron DeSantis keeps making powerful enemies in Trump's GOP
Thirty minutes into a routine appearance Thursday on Florida's Gulf Coast, Gov. Ron DeSantis abruptly turned his fire on a fellow Republican, accusing a veteran state lawmaker of betraying the party's voters. Hours later, President Donald Trump endorsed that same lawmaker, Joe Gruters, to become the next chairman of the Republican National Committee. For DeSantis, the episode reinforced a pattern: picking fights that come back to haunt him. Trump's inner circle was already full of people who have no love lost for the Florida governor — a reality that has isolated DeSantis within his home state ever since he ended his 2024 presidential campaign. Now, the most powerful official post in the Republican Party is likely to be filled by another foe, further clouding the political ambitions of both DeSantis and his wife, Casey. Ron DeSantis, who has kept the door open to another White House bid, could find himself running in a presidential primary partially controlled by an RNC chairman he has repeatedly spurned. Casey DeSantis, meanwhile, has taken steps toward succeeding her husband in Tallahassee next year in a race that would pit her against Rep. Byron Donalds, a Naples Republican backed by both Trump and Gruters. The elevation of Gruters to lead the RNC blindsided Gov. DeSantis, according to people close to his political operation. With Trump's support, Gruters had previously filed to run for chief financial officer of Florida in 2026, a statewide position, and the RNC reelected the current party chairman, Michael Whatley, to another term in January following the GOP's successes last fall. While Gruters was RNC treasurer, a promotion seemed unlikely anytime soon. It also appeared as though DeSantis and Trump had largely buried the hatchet after their contentious presidential primary last year. They stood side-by-side earlier this month for the opening of a new migrant detention center in the Everglades known as 'Alligator Alcatraz,' where they showered each other in compliments. 'You are my friend, and you'll always be my friend, and we may have some skirmishes, even in the future. I doubt it, but I will always come back, because we have blood that seems to match pretty well,' Trump said. But the political playing field changed rapidly Thursday, when Trump's daughter-in-law, Lara Trump, decided not to run for Senate in North Carolina. Whatley, a former party chair in the Tar Heel State, then made clear that he would run instead with Trump's backing, leaving an opening atop the party. By then, DeSantis had spent weeks trying to take down Gruters. He appointed state Sen. Blaise Ingoglia, a close ally, to become the state's CFO and immediately backed him in the GOP primary against Gruters. In appearances around Florida, he shrugged off Trump's endorsement while bashing Gruters' conservative credentials. 'If George Washington rose from the dead and came back and tapped me on the shoulder and said, 'Will you appoint Joe Gruters CFO?' My response would be, 'No,'' DeSantis said earlier this month. 'I can't do that without betraying the voters that elected me to lead this state in a conservative direction.' The criticism continued Thursday when DeSantis appeared just outside Gruters' district to pile on more attacks. But that evening, Trump threw his support behind Whatley for US Senate and Gruters for RNC chair in a post on social media. The ramifications of DeSantis' maneuvering against Gruters quickly crystalized. 'The governor did not see this coming at all,' a person close to DeSantis acknowledged. 'He fumbled this 1,000%.' A spokesperson for DeSantis' political operation did not respond to questions from CNN. Gruters declined to comment. A person familiar with Gruters' thinking told CNN that he hopes to lead the party through the 2028 presidential cycle. DeSantis has long earned a reputation in Florida for burning bridges on the way to the top. At first, the approach paid off. In 2018, DeSantis flouted the party establishment by running for governor and knocking off the preferred Republican thanks to Trump's support. He then unceremoniously jettisoned the operatives who helped him win, including veteran Republican strategist Susie Wiles and top adviser James Blair. As he amassed political clout, he stepped over other Republicans in the state, including many in the congressional delegation, who grumbled at their lack of relationship with the state's pugnacious leader. For a time, it appeared DeSantis could be the future of the party, and he ran for president over the objections of Trump, his former friend. But as DeSantis' presidential campaign floundered, the enemies he made along the way resurfaced. Many of those members of Congress endorsed Trump over their home-state governor. Wiles became Trump's co-campaign manager. Trump ridiculed DeSantis en route to defeating him. After his November victory, Trump named Wiles his chief of staff and Blair to oversee his political operation from the White House. Chris LaCivita, Trump's other campaign manager who feuded with DeSantis during the presidential primary, is spearheading the GOP's midterm efforts. Other Floridians more loyal to Trump than DeSantis have been handed key roles, including Attorney General Pam Bondi and Secretary of State Marco Rubio. DeSantis has yet to course correct as he regroups in Florida. He continues to recruit candidates to go up against Donalds — one of those Republicans who endorsed Trump over the governor — if Casey DeSantis doesn't run. He has publicly clashed with state lawmakers from his own party for blocking his agenda, lobbing personal attacks. Still, few people in Florida politics once close to the governor could comprehend why Ron DeSantis didn't appoint Gruters as CFO to extend a low-stakes olive branch to Trump. Now, they said, he may pay a price. 'His blind spot is he doesn't have a magnanimous bone in his body,' a veteran Republican fundraiser in Florida said. 'Once he has a negative opinion of someone, he cannot pivot even out of political necessity.'
Miami Herald
4 hours ago
- Miami Herald
Calif., Illinois may fight new Texas congressional maps with their own
As the Texas Legislature plans to redraw congressional maps in an effort to increase Republican members in the U.S. House, the governors of California and Illinois may devise their own new borders. Traditionally, the boundaries are changed every 10 years with the latest U.S. Census data but Texas Gov. Greg Abbott has called a special legislative session after pressure from the White House to preserve the GOP majority in the U.S. House. President Donald Trump believes an additional five seats could be created by changing the borders. Of the state's 38 districts, 25 are held by Republicans. Democrats hold seats in big cities of Austin, Dallas, El Paso, Fort Worth, Houston, Laredo, McAllen, San Antonio. Ahead of the 2026 midterm elections, Republicans hold a 219-212 advantage in the House with four vacancies -- three Democrats who died and one Republican who resigned this week. More than a dozen Texas House members flew to Illinois and California -- two blue states -- on Friday for a meeting with California Gov. Gavin Newsom and Illinois Gov. JB Pritzkeper, during which they revealed their intentions. 'Donald Trump called up Governor Abbott for one simple reason: to rig the 2026 elections. California's moral high ground means nothing if we're powerless because of it,' Newsom said after meeting with Democrats from the Texas House. 'This moment requires us to be prepared to fight fire with fire. Whether that's a special election, a ballot initiative, a bill, a fight in court. If they proceed in Texas, we will be ready.' 'This is not a bluff. This is real, and trust me, it's more real after listening to these leaders today, how existential this is,' Newsom said. As the most populous state in the nation, California has 43 Democratic members of the house and nine Republican members, while Illinois is represented by 14 Democrats and three Republicans. 'Everything is on the table,' Pritzer said. The Illinois governor said he doesn't want to redraw the maps but 'if they're going to take this drastic action, then we might also take drastic action to respond.' 'We want the country to understand [that] what's going on in Texas is a national battle,' State Rep. Richard Pena Raymond, a Democrat from Laredo, said. Raymond told Pritzner that redistricting is 'clearly aimed at affecting the entire country.' Responsibility for determining Congressional district maps differs from state to state. In California, an independent commission approved by voters in 2010 works on the maps. Illinois maps, on the other hand, are put together by the state lawmakers have been drawn strongly to favor the Democrat Party in the state. Newsom said he is considering having a referendum to change the rules before the 2026 election, unless the Legislature comes up with another solution, which would take two-thirds of legislators voting in favor of. 'We have to fight fire with fire,' Newsom said. Two other Democratic governors are considering new maps -- Phil Murphy in New Jersey and Kathy Hochul in New York. 'There's other states that are violating the rules,' Hochul said during a news conference on Thursday. 'I'm going to look at it closely with Hakeem Jeffries,' a New York member of the House, as well has House minority leader. In New York, Democrats have a 19-7 advantage as a result of their districting maps. 'It's deplorable,' Murphy said during an interview at the summer meeting of the bipartisan National Governors Association in Colorado Springs. 'If they're going to play these games, we're going to have to be just as aggressive. We can't bring a knife to a gunfight.' Democrats hold nine of the 12 seats in New Jersey. In Florida, the state Supreme Court on July 17 upheld its newest congressional map. He said he believes the state had been 'malappropriated' and redistricting 'would be appropriate' in a few years. Florida's congressional delegation is controlled by Republicans, 20-8. In Ohio, legislators are required to redraw maps before 2026. The GOP has 10 of the 15 seats. Colorado Gov. Jared Polis is against redistricting more frequently. The state's maps are overseen by an independent commission and it's eight U.S. House seats are evenly split 4-4. Texas last redrew its borders in mid-cycle in 2003 after the GOP gained control of both chambers for the first time since Reconstruction. In Texas, Abbott noted a July 7 letter from the Justice Department that said majority Black and Hispanic districts in Dallas need to be redrawn based on a decision by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit last year. The DOJ said those districts are 'unconstitutional racial gerrymanders,' but Abbott argued the opposite in 2021. In federal court in El Paso, he argued race had not been taken into account there. 'We are no longer compelled to have coalition districts,' Abbott said in an interview with KDFW in Dallas. U.S. Rep. Joaquin Castro, a San Antonio Democrat, appeared at a state House hearing. 'That's what's at stake here, whether you all are going to work for the people of Texas, as we used to do, to try to do, or whether you take your commandments from Donald Trump and the White House,' Castro said. 'I hope that you all will choose to do the business of the people of Texas, as this body has a history of being independent from the federal government.' Copyright 2025 UPI News Corporation. All Rights Reserved.
Yahoo
11 hours ago
- Yahoo
Effort continues to fix South Dakota elections that don't need fixing
In the past few years, a certain segment of South Dakota society has become adamant about making specific improvements in the way we live. Is this a citizen quest for more education funding? No. Is it a movement to put often overlooked Native American issues at the front of the state agenda? No. Is it a grassroots effort to revamp the way South Dakotans pay taxes? No. This effort is aimed at cleaning up the state's elections. 'Hold on,' you might say. 'I didn't know there was a problem with our elections.' Well, there isn't. But that isn't keeping the issue from being front and center at the Legislature and in county commission meetings across the state. In the last legislative session there were more than 50 election-related bills introduced. About half of those had to deal with 'election integrity' in the areas of voter qualification, technology and security. That's a great deal of attention being paid to a part of government that, in the past, has been noted for working just fine. Some of these bills may be duplicates. It has become a practice in the Legislature to introduce similar bills in the Senate and in the House. That way, if cooler heads prevail in the Senate, there's still a similar bill in the House, where bad ideas go to flourish. Spurring on the quest for election integrity is an entity called South Dakota Canvassing Group. The group's mission statement is on its website: 'We are a volunteer organization working to restore free, fair, transparent and secure elections in South Dakota, now and for future generations.' Their work to 'restore' elections in South Dakota implies that voting here has gone off the rails. If the Canvassing Group wants to ferret out corruption and illegalities in elections, they're best off moving to another state. South Dakota, with a history of fair elections, doesn't need their help. According to a story by The Dakota Scout, many of the election integrity chasers in this state got their inspiration at a three-day event in Sioux Falls. It turns out that their North Star, their inspiration, their muse, is none other than Mike Lindell. He's not just the My Pillow guy; he's the My President's Election was Stolen guy. Lindell was, and continues to be, one of the staunchest supporters of the idea that Donald Trump was somehow cheated out of victory in the 2020 election. At his 2021 'Cyber Symposium' in Sioux Falls, Lindell spent so much time offering false claims about Dominion Voting Systems throwing the election to Joe Biden that he was recently sued for defaming one of the company's executives. The jury awarded the executive $2.3 million in damages. Some bills backed by the Canvassing Group were approved by the Legislature and signed by the governor: assigning a federal-only ballot to people who don't live permanently in the state, changing the definition of resident eligibility, designating county voter registration files as public records, changing the process for challenging someone's residency status, increasing the penalty for voting illegally, placing citizenship status on driver's licenses, and sending a constitutional amendment to voters clarifying that a person must be a U.S. citizen to vote in the state. However, just as Lindell continues to spout his falsehoods about the 2020 election, look for the Canvassing Group to keep up the pressure on legislators for more election integrity laws that aren't needed. On its website, the top issue on the group's want list is an effort to make Election Day a holiday. In the last session, this came to the Legislature in a bill sponsored by Dell Rapids Republican Tom Pischke. Pischke explained to the Senate State Affairs Committee that a holiday was needed because in some communities there are not enough poll workers nor enough polling places. He said he hoped to work on solutions to those problems without legislation, asking the committee to table the bill. Creating a Tuesday Election Day holiday might free up more people to work on the elections, but it could just as easily cut down on voter participation. Instead of looking ahead to how they'll mark their ballots, citizens could just as easily be looking ahead to using a vacation day on Monday to create a long weekend. South Dakota has a long history of running fair, accurate elections. For all their finger-pointing and hand-wringing, the Canvassing Group and the legislators who indulge them can't change that. Election integrity legislation amounts to nothing more than solutions in search of problems, trying to fix a system that doesn't need fixing. Dana Hess spent more than 25 years in South Dakota journalism, editing newspapers in Redfield, Milbank and Pierre. He's retired and lives in Brookings, working occasionally as a freelance writer. This article was originally published on South Dakota Searchlight. This article originally appeared on Sioux Falls Argus Leader: Effort continues to fix South Dakota elections that don't need fixing
