Democracy is dying — not in darkness, but in plain sight at the Florida Capitol.

Republican legislators want to make it outrageously expensive for citizens to launch ballot initiatives. In the past, voters have used their direct access to the ballot for a wide range of issues: An increased minimum wage; a ban on dog racing; multiple initiatives on casino gambling; term limits; the medical use of marijuana; voting rights for people who had prior felony convictions but had paid their debt to society; mandates for government in the sunshine; and other ethical issues.

Some were too minor to be in the constitution. But most were legitimate issues that legislators stubbornly ignored until voters forced their hand.

Lawmakers have always hated these citizen-backed initiatives, and done everything possible to throw up roadblocks. But this year, they want to kill direct democracy — the only alternative left for frustrated Floridians.

House Bill 1205, approved on a 14-4 vote by the House Government Operations Subcommittee on Thursday, would require a $1 million bond before sponsors can begin a petition drive, restricts them to one at a time and shortens the deadlines for collecting and turning in signed petitions.

Combine these changes with other measures, and the path to a successful signature-driven ballot question becomes nearly impossible, particularly for the purer-minded efforts that don’t have oceans of special-interest money behind them.

Fewer circulators, steeper fines

These attacks include some provisions that would serve little public purpose. If it passes, even volunteer petition circulators must be Florida residents. The bill imposes $50,000 fines on sponsors for each solicitor found to not be a U.S. citizen.

All that may be unconstitutional. It’s unquestionably unfair.

More than three hours of debate and intense testimony made it clear: The intent is to deter any more campaigns like those last year to restore abortion rights and legalize recreational marijuana.

Both had heavy financial support, including out-of-state interests. Both drew majority support. But both fell short of the 60% approval required.

It’s already very difficult to pass an initiative facing organized opposition. Both initiatives likely would have passed if Gov. Ron DeSantis hadn’t misused state agencies and taxpayers’ money to oppose them.

Overwhelming opposition

In the House, more than 130 citizens signed up to speak against the bill or logged in opposition. Many were students, seeing first-hand how democracy in practice mocks its theory.

So many registered to speak that the chairperson, Rep. Linda Cheney, R-St. Pete Beach, cut their microphone time from three minutes each to two, then one, and silenced overlong speakers in mid-sentence.

Cheney was determined to pass the bill before the panel’s noon adjournment time in the session’s first week. It has only one more committee stop, in House State Affairs, before reaching the floor.

One supporter, an anti-abortion activist, said the bill isn’t tough enough and touted the Senate version, SB 1414, which is even worse. It would forbid sponsors from collecting signatures for their own petitions. Individual voters would have to submit them to county election supervisors, like vote-by-mail ballots.

This is the more onerous, DeSantis-backed version.

The Senate Ethics and Elections Committee tackled that legislation Monday afternoon, with a similarly packed audience (though fewer attempted to speak) and the same outcome. Somehow, impossibly, the committee managed to make it worse by tacking on additional restrictions before passing it along party lines.

Florida’s iron-fisted attack on direct democracy is a back-door maneuver to repeal the 1968 constitutional reform that established the initiative process, without actually amending the Constitution to remove it.

That’s harder. It requires 60% approval and it would likely fail, so the scheme is to suppress initiatives by creating a series of impossible hurdles. HB 1205 leaves the initiative wheezing. SB 1414 would strangle it. None of the other 23 states that allow initiatives, most in the Midwest and West, go so far out of their way to discourage them.

It’s deeply disappointing that the statewide association of election supervisors supports HB 1205 “with a couple of little tweaks,” as its lobbyist, David Ramba, told House members.

Stay out of it, supervisors

Bad idea. Election supervisors should not take sides in a political debate involving ballot access. This could easily damage their hard-earned reputations for political neutrality.

It’s costly and time-consuming for supervisors to validate so many petitions, as nearly 900,000 valid signatures are required for an initiative to reach the ballot. But that comes with being agents of democracy.

There’s no doubt that some paid solicitors forge names, but that’s already a crime. Prosecuting them under that law should suffice. Election supervisors have referred cases to prosecutors.

A DeSantis administration study that alleged voluminous forgeries in last year’s campaigns was unreliable because it was a projection based on forged petitions that supervisors had already detected in four counties.

These bills are the worst assaults in a relentless, years-long campaign against initiatives. Requiring 60% voter approval for amendments was just the beginning.

Every Republican on the House panel voted for HB 1205 One Democrat voted with Republicans, to his discredit: Rep. Jose Alvarez of Kissimmee. That’s disheartening, as Alvarez seemed relatively supportive of voters’ rights during the 2024 campaign.

Floridians, Republicans and Democrats alike, deserve legislators who are willing to protect their constituents’ voices.

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The Orlando Sentinel Editorial Board includes Executive Editor Roger Simmons, Opinion Editor Krys Fluker and Viewpoints Editor Jay Reddick. The Sun Sentinel Editorial Board consists of Executive Editor Gretchen Day-Bryant, Editorial Page Editor Steve Bousquet, Deputy Editorial Page Editor Dan Sweeney and editorial writers Pat Beall and Martin Dyckman. Send letters to insight@orlandosentinel.com.

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