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Florida's 2023 Session Week Seven Wrap · Conversations: Special Guests with Preston Scott

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All right, here we go. It's the third hour of the morning Show
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with Thrust and Scott. Five minutes after the hour, I'm just I'm having
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one of those Mondays around here. I don't have these days often, but
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I'm having one. And so thankfully this hour features much much less of me
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and more of him joining me as sal news o the James Madison Institute and
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he's vice president of policy. Less of me is a very good thing today.
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We can we can make that happen. I don't know if I'm a
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you know, good consolation prize for your well in the audience. Well,
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you you absolutely are, because you're going to get us focused on the session
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and we are. We are definitely in the home stretch. Are we going
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to see the handkerchief drop on time? You think? I think we will.
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They announce the budget conference members, so confrees have been announced. It
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looks like it's going to begin today, and that gives them two weeks,
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two full business weeks of working through the budget. They're not that far apart.
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So in order to drop the hankie on time, they have to lay
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the budget on the table, which is it starts the cooling off period seventy
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two hours to buy a handgun or to vote on the budget in Florida,
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and so if they want to signy die in time, they have to lay
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the budget on the table by Friday of next week. Is it just me
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or has this been a session with regard to angst or controversy or disagreement.
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It's been a very calm, peaceful session considering the large yes of the issues
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tackled. It depends other than the other side of the aisle performing a few
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answers. There you go. I was going to say, it depends on
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who you ask. If you were to ask the Republican caucus and those folks
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who are kind of in the vast majority of those votes cast, I would
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say, yes, it has been a without controversy. There hasn't been a
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lot of back and forth between the House and Senate. The chambers at times
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in years past have been acrimonious. Yes, there's been none of that.
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I think there's an element to this where you have had a number of House
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members over the last several cycles getting elected into Senate seats and so that still
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have some friends back there. Yeah. Absolutely, they used to chair those
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committees, so they know how it goes and so. But if you were
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to ask the handful of folks who have been yelling and screaming and tossing underwear
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from the gallery, they would say the exact opposite. I just disagree with
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that. The governor, he's been busy traveling the country and the world.
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Yeah, he left the other day for Asia and Israel, I believe,
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Japan, South Korea, and and a stop in Israel for the seventy fifth
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birthday of the current iteration of Israel from nineteen forty eight. In fact,
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I read just last night that net and Yah who's going to meet with him?
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So that's a that's a you know, good, good thing for Florida.
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Uh. Spoke at the Heritage fiftieth Heritage Foundation fiftieth anniversary party, which
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I happened to be at, which was just a great speech um as well
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as I think It's New Hampshire, Ohio, Utah and pretty pretty big crowds
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at all of them. The former president, we talked about it briefly,
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had some very unkind things to say about the state of Florida. It doesn't
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make a lot of sense to me, sal because he's been getting nothing but
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endorsements from Florida's congressional caucus. Yeah. And the odd thing about this,
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which we were talking about offline, is what I said was I find it
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troubling that he issued that like four page diatribe about how bad Florida is right
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after hosting all of the members of the Florida congressional delegation who had endorsed him
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at Mara Lago. It just doesn't make sense to me. Practically. I'm
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trying to figure out what the political calculus is there, and I don't honestly
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know if there is one. You know, there's certainly something to be said
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for there's this perception that the unofficial campaigns kind of hit a bump or two
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with that congressional delegation swing toward Trump. But when I am out around the
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country and I see the governor speaking to these crowds, it doesn't resonate.
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It's something very different, and so I'm paying attention to that. As you
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know, this unofficial campaign likely moves into official. He is vice president of
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policy for the James Madison Institute, the one, the only Salmuzo. And
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now we get to what happened last week. Sure, lots of committee meetings,
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lots of long committee meetings, and so the governor did sign the bill
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allowing for an eight to four jury imposition of the capital of capital punishment.
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And so my guess is is that that's going to get litigated, likely at
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the federal level. And we were talking offline, and we've articulated it before,
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just really not comfortable with the reactionary pose on this one. Yeah,
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it's and it's weird because you have it. You know, on one hand,
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you have a unanimous jury saying there's guilt here, and they knew going
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in otherwise they couldn't have served on it that it was a capital case.
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And so I'm just of the opinion that you just have to reserve capital punishment
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for DNA video proof and admissions of guilt. Yeah, And as I had
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mentioned to you offline, philosophically, I'm opposed to the capital to capital punishment
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in the United States. With that being said, I can understand and accept
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a society that does impose it for exactly those sets of circumstances. This kind
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of takes it in the opposite direction. And given that there are research studies
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out there based on data of exonerations that could be as many as one in
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ten of those folks on death row are in fact not guilty of the crime
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that they're there for. This would likely send that figure higher, and I'm
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just not comfortable with that. All right. When we get to House Bill
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three, the Senate passed it. That's one that we've spent a lot of
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time on. Justin Haskins is very interested in the anti ESG bill. What's
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happen? Yeah, HB three. So the Senate took the House version of
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the bill and passed it as is. This was a big priority of JMI.
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We've worked with Hartland Institute over the last couple of years. Chair Bob
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Rommel, who chair of the Commerce Committee, was the sponsor of HB three.
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It is by and large going to be considered the single most kind of
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single most monumental policy reform against EIESG in the country. So those that have
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passed thus far just fall short of this one here. So here's what it
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does. It's provisions include a ban on any state and local investment decisions to
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use ESG scoring criteria. So if a pension fund like the Florida Retirement System
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has money in one of these hedge funds that use ESG, it's gone but
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I think this next provision may be the most important one, the one that
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impacts the people out there needing to borrow money from time to yah. So
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you've got a couple of provisions there. Bans investment managers from issuing ESG or
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green bonds that use rating or using rating agencies that employ those criteria. And
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it bans financial institutions from discriminating against consumers based on religious or political beliefs or
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affiliations or at any kind that might use an ESG score. So that was
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a very important part of the provision that's called the Fair Access provision of the
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bill. It was one that had kind of gotten bounced back and forth in
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terms of conversations on whether it would kind of come out or stay in.
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Ultimately it stayed in, and I think it strengthens the bill allsold. It's
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it's a huge deal. Yeah, yeah, absolutely. So the notion that
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if you are a conservative, evangelical Christian who maintains biblical principles in terms of
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your corporate philosophy, think hobby lobby or you know, a small company along
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I'm thick and gun shops and ammo any of this all the way down the
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road. I mean, it starts out with environmental, social and governance,
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but easily the net gets cast wider to things like gun shows or gun shops
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and those kinds of operations. Sound News with me from the James Madison Institute.
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Okay, what else got done? A number of things. So you
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got the Senate tax package that was released, largely aligning with the governor's list.
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And what you're seeing this year, which is not uncommon to prior years,
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is the House is playing I would say a little bit more coy with
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what is initially in their package, and they're angling for if there are additional
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House priorities and maybe hitting hurdles one, you know, kind of way to
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kind of negotiates hold back on some of either the governors or the Senate's wish
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list and marketing. Yeah, it's it's horse trading. One element of note
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that is important for any of the viewers with very, very very young kids.
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The current temporary sales tax exemption on diapers would be made permanent. And
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I do believe that's in both the House and the Senate's package. It's kind
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of a bipartisan thing. Um. It started a year or two ago with
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the package. I think it was a year of sales SAX exemption there.
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That's really a little bit of signaling more than anything else, because it really
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isn't an effect many ones, anyone's bottom line, even the purchasers. Yeah,
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not a not a bottom line, although I'm sure there are some parents
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who would say, you don't know how many diapers I go through. So
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yes, every little bit helps, Every little bit helps. But you know,
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without a state income tax, which I you know, I'm glad for,
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and without a lot of the tax infrastructure that some of the big government
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states have, you know, we have to look at things on the margin
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in our tax package that other states just you know, don't do. I'm
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fascinated by HB nine seventy three. Sure, this was one that I saw
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last week. I hadn't been following. But what it does is it allows
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for an extended window of time for car buyers to change their mind. I
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had always been told that you had a three day window on a car purchase
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to just take it back and send it back and whatnot. This would actually
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only apply to used cars. And this is one I'm trying to do some
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rough analysis on on whether or not I like it or not. But it's
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a sixty day window to return a used car to the purchaser, So any
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purchase or any seller or just dealers. I believe it's just dealers. It
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wouldn't apply to private sellers, especially when they use the kind of as is
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provisions in the contract. But sixty days just has my hairs up a little
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bit, and so I'm kind of trying to figure out what the impetus is
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there. It's interesting because that's a long time. It is it is,
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and it's a long time to perhaps trash a car and then take it back
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well, and I think there are there are protectional provisions in there for for
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if you do damage of it, it's got to be returning and litigation.
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I just see this as a lit against dream. Yeah, and I did
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not see any language in the bill that kind of went to the mileage on
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the car. So you know, buy a car taken on a road trip
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for for thirty days, return it. You know it may be in the
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same condition, but it's got, you know, a few thousand more miles
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on it. There's a number of things in this and I'm starting to look
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at like I said, we hadn't been following it up up until it got
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some movements. So all right, we got a couple of minutes left during
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this segments, so go through what you can for sure. Fourteen seventy five,
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the Hemp Bill. It originally was going to be a fairly aggressive layer
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of regulations on the hemp industry, which is different than marijuana, to be
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clear. But they were trying to apply some of the regulatory mechanisms for THHC
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onto this that's gone away. It's a much more watered down bill there.
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That seems to be moving a little bit now. HB seven three three Middle
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and high school start times implementation by twenty twenty six, so no earlier than
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eight am for middle school, eight thirty am for high school, and no
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school year could begin earlier than August tenth, fifteen twenty one. One of
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three. This is a big one, yeah, One of three bills kind
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of that are in the direction of the trans movement type of thing. Bathroom
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facility requirements based on biological sex pass the House. It was sent over in
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messages what's called sent over in messages to the Senate. The companion bill is
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on its final stop this Tuesday. There are two others we can get to
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as well. That would mean that counties, for example, Leon County happened
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to pass an ordinance that allowed you to pick whatever bathroom you wanted, it
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would pre empact. It would pre empact. Yeah, and for public public
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facilities, you have to have a men's room a women's room, and then
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if you so choose either or Okay, so fifteen fifty the PBM bill,
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Pharmacy benefit managers. This would prohibit the practice of spread pricing, which is
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when a PBM when they negotiate a price with a drug manufacturer and then they
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lower the price with the insurance providers, and then they pocket the difference.
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It's it's how they make money negotiating those things in order to serve as the
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middleman. The big question on this one is going to be how insurance companies
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respond to the changes. Some are saying it's gonna increase premiums. Grover Norquist
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and ATR Americans for Tax Reform are saying higher overall prices. Others are saying
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not. But it passed unanimously forty to nothing. That's amazing that in and
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of itself. Yeah, especially considering the dynamic on that bill. Salt Neuzo
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with me. He's the vice president of Policy with the James Madison Institute,
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and we're just talking about things that happened last week. Still yeah, oh
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yeah, we haven't gotten to this coming week, or I mean, a
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whole host of bills have a moved during those eight hour long committee meetings.
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This one is interesting because it kind of sort of dovetails with the whole eight
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to four things, but not really sure. HB. Twelve to ninety seven,
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allowing for capital punishment for child rapists. It is headed to the governor.
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It was voted at thirty four to five in the Senate, ninety five
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to fourteen in the House. Does that surprise you No, Nope. Politically
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very very popular. It pulls great, there's no doubt about it. Does
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not surprise me at all. However, it will be immediately litigated as it
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runs directly a foul of a Supreme Court of the United States precedent that specifically
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mentions child rapists as not being able to be imposed a capital crime. How
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old is that ruling, do you know? Oh? Pretty old? So
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this is another intentional law passed specifically to challenge absolutely Supreme Court. Absolutely so,
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they feel that the makeup of the current court might be ripe to have
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them overturn precedent on this one. All right, next short seven fourteen,
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the Vacation Rental Bill. Yeah, So for a number of years they've been
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trying to impose a little bit more preemption on the locals, trying to regulate
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airbnbs and the like. This bill would actually give locals a little more power
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to regulate short term rentals. And I want to say it was back in
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twenty eleven the original preemption. It was limited. It did not include tax
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and bed tax collections and remittance. So there's some things in there that would
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kind of strengthen that two fifty four prohibiting any care to miners that would aid
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them in a gender transition, no hormone treatment, no puberty blockers, no
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surgeries of any kind. A couple of weeks ago, you had posed a
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question about this being already illegal, and I actually responded what I thought was
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correct, but it wasn't. So I wanted to clarify that it's already prohibited
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by the State Board of Medicine per some rules that they had passed back in
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November. But those rules can be at any time, so this would place
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it into statute. It's a second of the three bills from last week that
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kind of passed in relation to that kind of cultural social thing. And this
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bill is sending people that are into the transition movement nuts. Yes, absolutely,
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You've got folks, even representatives, screaming about protect our trans babies.
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And it's just kind of a it's an inflection point, and I think what
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we are seeing is that the vocal tide is turning where a lot of this
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movement had been too far. Yeah. A lot of this movement had been
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able to kind of germinate and exist because folks were whether or not they were
18:08
scared or RELI live your own life, do your own thing. Yeah,
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but they pushed and encroached into society norms too far. And to his credit,
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and I think you had played it last week, Randy finds clothes on
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this bill was quite possibly one of the best closings I've ever heard in my
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you know, twenty some years. All Right, so this is likely going
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to get done. Yeah, yeah, this is I believe this is going
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to go over to the Governor's desk. I have no doubt he would sign
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it. When he was in DC, he had actually articulated this is a
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you know, as a win for Florida, So expect that, all right.
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HB three seventy nine restricting social media use in school. This is from
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Senator Danny Burgess and Representative Yeager blocks social media on school WiFi and prohibits phone
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using class. That's been sent to the governor. School Board races Partisans.
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School Board races will go on the ballot as well as the third one in
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the in the Triumvirate, they're banning miners from sexually lewd entertainment performances onto the
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governor. It's just kind of shocking. We have to pass a law for
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that. Um. There is a proposed committee bill that's dropped on election security.
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We can kind of unpack what it does maybe next week. And the
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first bill of the twenty twenty four session in response to the forty five AM
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mix up on the emergency alert system, Senator Blazing glow Engolia has indicated he's
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commenced drafting what will be Senate Bill one for twenty twenty four, the Stop
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Wake Act. You think we need that when they made a mistake, No,
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we do not, but he likes to generate some publicity on these things.
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They nixed the contract with the with the folks who made the mistake,
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and we'll move on final segment for the week with Sal News the James Madison
20:00
Institute, as we look at the final lap of the legislative session, which
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is more than this week. It's this week and next and then we'll see
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right, Yeah, siny Dye is on a Tuesday, scheduled four. So
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I also got to tell you, like you said final segment, like,
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this is the quickest fifty minutes of my entire week. Bring session. Well,
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you're trying to do the impossible. Yeah, I mean seriously, we're
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taking thirty minutes of airtime and trying to squeeze two weeks of legislative action.
20:30
What's happened in What's coming? Yeah? Yeah, so what's coming? All
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right? What's coming? Budget conference begins. The allocations are out for more
20:37
than forty billion in general revenues. Now that's different than the total budget,
20:41
which is like one hundred and fifteen billion, but that one hundred and fifteen
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billion includes federal dollars for medicaid, trust funds and a whole host of other
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things. So the forty billion in general revenues has now been allocated. And
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I want to say if I remember correctly, the biggest chunk of that was
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education, around fourteen billions. So that will begin the process. And it's
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members of the House and the Senate they host the conference committees and folks present
21:07
on their bills that have allocations and things like that. All right, big
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week for appropriations and fiscal policy committee meetings. The marathons continue. Bills will
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begin making their way through those final committees to get to the chamber calendars.
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If there's largely agreement on the big issues in the budget, do these really
21:29
act as marathon meetings? Yes, because not everything that is in that is
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going through these ends up. On the conference side, it is anything with
21:40
a fiscal implication, even of a policy, so you'll have them speeding through.
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And on the Senate side, their time constraint. They will not unless
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they waive the rules, which requires two thirds majority, they will not be
21:52
able to extend the time. Now they've done that a little bit here and
21:56
there this session because they have a supermajure. But I don't think that's going
22:00
to be likely in approbes. Okay, there was a delay from last week
22:06
on the data privacy bill, so that's coming back up this week. I've
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heard that there's a big amendment on the House version of this that's going to
22:14
be in response to a lot of the concerns coming from conservatives in the business
22:18
community. Haven't seen the language yet, but paying a lot of protect a
22:22
lot of attention to that. The big Union Transparency and Reform bill up in
22:29
the full House Tuesday. They will take the Senate language from a Senator Engolia,
22:34
this is one of jmi's priorities for the last four years. This is
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not I mean, this is simply saying to a union member and to a
22:42
union, to a union, you're going to collect your own dues, among
22:47
other things. There's a transparency and accountability. You've got to get audited financial
22:49
statements and a number of other things. All of it is common sense policy,
22:56
but the unions have been able to thwart it for the last several years,
23:00
and they're already trying to intimidate teachers before this has even been absolutely absolutely
23:04
and to Senator in Golia's point as well, he's made the point that if
23:11
you're afraid of this, you're afraid of competition. So when the legislature passed
23:18
the recertification bill back a few years ago, union membership actually went up.
23:22
Why did it go up? Because they realized they had to recruit people.
23:26
They started to become more competitive, and that is create a market for representation.
23:33
Most of the employees in unions have never voted on the specific union that
23:38
they're a part of. More Disney bills, it looks like they're aiming to
23:45
kill some of the provisions made by Disney's prior board. Hoops. Yeah,
23:48
that battle's going to keep going. In addition, HJR. One twenty nine
23:53
upping the threshold on constitutional amendments to a two thirds majority of the voters.
23:59
So we're going to see where that goes. And then I'm paying attention now
24:03
to HB nine seventeen. It originally allowed Major League Baseball teams to get around
24:08
the state minimum wage laws because they have contracts with provisions for housing and such.
24:14
They're also going to include a limitation on what are called living wage ordinances
24:18
at local government, So where a local government says, if you want to
24:22
contract with us, you have to pay twenty five dollars an hour, and
24:26
it's popular in California. We would be preempting it in this bill. All
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right, we made it, did it. We did it. Every note,
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every last note, well done, thank you sir. Always a pleasure.
24:38
Next week, always all right sald News. Go with us as we
24:42
finish up the legislative session in the next couple of weeks. Here in the
24:45
Morning Show with Preston Scott