DeSantis' culture wars grabbed headlines -- and legal challenges that cost $17 million
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https://archive.vn/y3ZnS
TALLAHASSEE
Gov. Ron DeSantis’ political strategy has won national attention for his ability to shrewdly select culture war issues and use a compliant Florida Legislature to advance them.
But while the agenda has drawn more than 15 lawsuits, it has so far yielded few legal victories, and cost Florida taxpayers nearly $17 million in legal fees to date.
In case after case, courts have scaled back, thrown out, or left in legal limbo rules and laws that impose restrictions on social media giants, limit voting, curb gender-related health care, influence speech in the workplace, college campuses and classrooms and create new crimes for peaceful protests.
DeSantis has had a few successes. Courts sided with the administration’s challenge to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control’s safety rules for cruise companies. An appeals court reinstated the state’s ban on mask mandates in school districts during the peak of the COVID-19 pandemic, and the same appellate court refused to put on hold the governor’s congressional redistricting map that gave Republicans four additional seats in the U.S. House.
Trial court rulings are also pending on lawsuits challenging his ousting of a Democratic state attorney, relocating migrants from Texas to Martha’s Vineyard, the congressional redistricting map, a new 15-week abortion ban, and a measure requiring viewpoint surveys of students at employees on university campuses.
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