DeSantis Pulls Back on Property Tax Campaign

Ryan talks with Publisher of Southeast Politics Janelle Irwin-Taylor about Governor Ron DeSantis stepping back from leading the campaign for Florida's property tax ballot initiative despite supporting tax relief. They also discuss the proposal's future and Byron Donalds completing a sweep of endorsements.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
The Ryan Gorman Show podcast presented by Verah and Farah,
accident attorneys from Tama.

Speaker 2 (00:07):
Let's bring in Southeast Politics publisher Janelle Irwin Taylor. You
can find overworking a whole lot more at Southeast politics
dot com and you can follow ran X two at
Janelle Irwin FL So Janelle. Governor DeSantis has been promoting
a major property tax cut for like over a year now.

(00:29):
This was his top priority going into his final year
in office. The legislature they put one on the ballot,
not one hundred percent what he wanted, but pretty close.
And now he's saying he's not going to campaign for

(00:50):
that ballot initiative. Why not?

Speaker 3 (00:55):
Yeah, so he is. One of his major concerns is
the appsence of a sort of fund to help cities
and counties that are most impacted by a loss of revenue.
Should this property tax elimination essentially, should that pass, it
would He pitched that as a way to say, you know, look,

(01:18):
I know that this disproportionately affects rural areas that really
rely on that property tax base to kind of keep
the government lights on, So you know, this is a
way to mitigate that problem for them. The larger cities
and counties. You know, they'll be able to absorb the
hit that was that was the school of thought, and

(01:39):
you know that wasn't included. So he has straight up
said he'll vote for this property tax break. He's going
to vote yes on it, but he's not going to
actively campaign for it. And he has said it's because
he didn't get what he wanted, which is just I mean,
there is a long pattern of this governor kind of
being a little hetchelent if you will. He you know,

(02:02):
he has said that he veto's member projects if that
member has gone against him in some way, and we
saw that happen with Vito's this year. You know, he
he just there's kind of a retribution aspect of his tenure,
and you're seeing that with people supporting kind of those

(02:26):
that he's not supporting. The Byron Donalds for example, So
you know you've got his cabinet supporting Byron Donald's, You've
got the future House Speaker and future Senate President are
supporting Byron Donalds. And those two came out and endorsed
Byron donald as soon as the budget was signed, which
tells you that they were just waiting until he couldn't
punish them anymore because he's now a lamb duck. So

(02:48):
there's a lot happening with that. Happy to dive into
more if you want.

Speaker 2 (02:52):
So. Another change, although this is one that I think
is going to help the amendment potentially pass in November.
The legislature's version protects school funding from the property tax
cut that was not in the governor's proposal, And again,
I think that's something that's actually going to help the
amendment get more support. If that wasn't part of the

(03:16):
final version, I think you'd have an even bigger problem
getting to that sixty percent threshold. But I also think
it's notable that the governor's pushback is that there's not
this state fund to help different local governments around Florida

(03:40):
deal with the loss of revenue, when what we've been
hearing from the Governor and the CFO has essentially been,
these local governments are wasting a bunch of your taxpayer dollars.
You could do this property tax cut and they can
live within their means and everything will be fine. So
there's like some mixed messaging, it feels like, coming from

(04:04):
the governor about the impact that this property tax cut
amendment would have if it were to pass.

Speaker 3 (04:12):
Yeah, you know, if you position it that broadly, it
certainly is seems like a mixed message. But I will say,
you know that there's a huge difference between a rural town,
you know, in the middle of the Panhandle and a

(04:33):
place like Tampa or Miami for Jacksonville. So he and
there's also politics at play there because those rural cities
and counties, those are the reddest places in the state.
So even though they're not that populous, he needs them
for this to pass because quite frankly, it's going to

(04:54):
receive more conservative support than it's going to receive liberal support.
So you know, you can't when the League of Cities
and the League of Counties goes out and says, don't
vote for this because here's what it's going to happen
in your communities. He needs He needed to have some
protection from cover in those super red rural cities and

(05:16):
counties to say it might, you know, hurt the big
cities and counties, but we're going to protect you. They
need to live within their means. So that is a
strategic way to make sure that you're not losing the
support of your reddest areas of the state.

Speaker 2 (05:33):
We're joined by Southeast Politics publisher Janelle Irwin Taylor. On
that note, I will just point out though, that if
his fund were to be part of this plan, then
you would have those rural towns and counties across the
state having to go to the state legislature I guess,

(05:53):
like every year and justify why they would need portions
of that fund given to them, which doesn't seem like
a very conservative setup to me. Where you've got the
state approving you know, what a local government might need
in these different county. I just don't think that would
have gone over well in those counties.

Speaker 3 (06:15):
It would certainly be the biggest attack on home rule
that I've ever seen, for sure.

Speaker 2 (06:21):
Right, all right, let's get to another big story you
alluded to this. I mean, the GOP primary race for
governors is pretty much over at this point. I mean,
Byron Donalds, he's got all the endorsements, he's got all
the money, and the polling is you know, and you
can say what you want about polling here in Florida. Still,

(06:41):
when Paul after pull after poll shows he's got this
massive lead, and it's just hard to see this going
any other way. Than Byron Donalds being the nominee.

Speaker 3 (06:51):
I mean, I never say never in politics, because you know,
you never know when there might be some sort of
they called on October surprise but for the purposes of
the primary, or like a you know, summer surprise. So
you know, something could always happen to shift the pendulum.
But as of right now, I do not envision any

(07:11):
scenario in which Byron Donalds loses this primary. So you know,
it does seem like it's all but over. But again,
you know, sentiment could shift. There was a period of
time there with the Iran War where it was looking like,
you know, people were souring on the Trump administration. And
if they're souring on the Trump administration, does that water

(07:31):
down the Trump endorsement for Byron Donalds And does that
cause some other folks to maybe reconsider their support. I mean,
there was some writing on the wall that there could
be signs of trouble ahead for Byron Donalds, but that's
subsided substantially, And you know, say, there's always a possibility
that something could come along, but it's looking increasingly unlikely.

Speaker 2 (07:52):
And time is running out. I mean, the primary is
almost yeah, exactly. Janelle Irwin Taylor, publisher of Southeast Politics,
with us this morning. You can check out all of
our work and a whole lot more at southeastpolitics dot
com and you can follow her on x at Janelle erwinfl.
Janelle really appreciate it time this morning.

Speaker 3 (08:11):
We'll talk to you soon.

Speaker 1 (08:12):
Thanks for having me make the Ryan Gorman Show podcast
Up we set on iHeartRadio, presented by Farah and Farah
Accident Attorneys, Tampa,