A standoff between Gov. Ron DeSantis and fellow Republicans in the Legislature is deepening – with differences over tax breaks now jeopardizing chances of finalizing a state budget in an already extended session.
DeSantis wants some kind of property tax give-back for Floridians.
House Speaker Daniel Perez, R-Miami, is touting a cut in the state’s 6% sales tax.
Both sides have been exchanging heated words and a May 9 blow-up has led lawmakers to scale-back on plans for budget committees to renew work next week at the Capitol.
Perez said Florida Senate President Ben Albritton “blew up the framework for the budget deal we had,” and lawmakers now must extend the 2025 session to June 30 to finish work on the state budget.
For his part, Albritton said it was useless to summon senators back next week to Tallahassee to pursue a doomed sales tax cut. Instead, in a memo to senators, Albritton pledged, “We will continue to work towards a final budget and tax relief package the House, Senate and governor can support.”
Here’s what’s fueling the divide. And a little history.
Sales taxes vs. property taxes
DeSantis is trying to catch a wave, making Florida among a dozen Republican-led states considering how to cut or eliminate property taxes.
No state has actually erased all property taxes, with 63% of voters in North Dakota last year rejecting a ballot measure that would’ve effectively done that.
DeSantis earlier called for sending $1,000 rebate checks to the state’s homesteaded property owners. But the Legislature ignored the idea.
Instead, lawmakers outlined plans to study the idea while generally backing DeSantis’ approach of putting a property tax overhaul on the November 2026 ballot.
But it’s getting tense. Perez barked back at DeSantis after the governor recently ridiculed the idea of cutting Florida’s sales tax. Perez said the state actually could cut sales tax now and property taxes later.
DeSantis has cast the House-Senate idea of reducing Florida’s sales tax by 0.25% – “a quarter of a penny,” as he recently characterized it – as a concept that will mostly help “the tourists and the foreigners.”
Roughly 16% of state sales tax dollars came from tourists in 2021-22, according to state economists. But everything else comes from Floridians and businesses, they concluded.
Property taxes power local governments, paying for police, fire, garbage pickup and other services whose futures could be clouded by a deep reduction.
Sales taxes also are considered a regressive tax, “one that creates a larger burden on lower-income taxpayers than on middle- or higher-income taxpayers,” as the nonpartisan Tax Foundation has explained. Since property taxes are imposed based on the market value of homes, office buildings and retail space, the tax is less regressive.
For his part, Perez has been defiant: “If the governor wants to veto that, he’s welcome to explain to the voters why he thinks they do not deserve actual and meaningful tax relief,” he said.
Bottom line: Tax cuts key to budget deal
Deciding on the tax cuts may be key to settling the 2025-26 state budget, which is set to go into effect on July 1.
But no tax cut deal maybe means no budget. Lawmakers are set, at least till recently, to end their extended session June 6.
Perez and Albritton, R-Wauchula, announced what they called the “framework” of a deal May 2. That included $2.8 billion in tax cuts, with the biggest share being the sales tax cut.
That cleared the way for a budget they promised would come in under the $115.6 billion level proposed by DeSantis for 2025-26.
But with DeSantis ready to veto the sales tax reduction and push for some kind of property tax cut, the stage could’ve been set for more drama — including a potential veto override of the governor. But given the bitterness now separating Perez and Albritton, that looks unlikely.
The House and Senate earlier this year overrode DeSantis’ veto of $57 million in funding for legislative support services. But the Senate refused to join in when the House’s later overrode four spending items from last year totaling about $4.7 million.
The needed three-fifths support for overriding DeSantis on a tax cut veto would be probable in the House. But now it’s clear the Senate isn’t ready to go to all-out war with the Republican governor, which a tax cut override would signal.
Will history repeat? Summer sessions are hot
It was 10 years ago, that Florida Republican leaders last battled with even a shade of the ferocity seen now.
At the time, Senate President Andy Gardiner, R-Orlando, a hospital executive, pushed senators to insist on expanding Medicaid to cover lower-income, working families.
The House, under Speaker Steve Crisafulli, R-Merritt Island, refused. He was backed by then-Gov. Rick Scott, co-founder of the Columbia Hospital Corp.
The regular session ended without a state budget. And a three-week special session in June was called that eventually ended with a state spending plan – but no Medicaid expansion.
Still, the three-week special session ended up costing taxpayers $651,435 extra for bringing legislators and staff back to the Capitol to complete their work. It stands as the longest, and costliest, special session of this century.
Lawmakers that year were also back for 12 days in August for another combative special session, this time on congressional and legislative redistricting.
But now, given the kind of harsh words being thrown about and the high-stakes nature of the clash underway between DeSantis and the Legislature, a rerun of 2015’s lost summer appears possible.
John Kennedy is a reporter in the USA TODAY Network’s Florida Capital Bureau. He can be reached at jkennedy2@gannett.com. Follow him on X: @JKennedyReport.
This article originally appeared on Tallahassee Democrat: Florida GOP divide on taxes, budget could make for long, hot summer at Capitol
Reporting by John Kennedy, USA TODAY NETWORK – Florida / Tallahassee Democrat
USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect
