Voters retain two Florida justices who tried to keep abortion, marijuana off ballot
The two Florida Supreme Court justices who were against putting the abortion and marijuana amendments on the November ballot were retained by two-thirds of the state’s voters.
After statewide votes were tallied Tuesday, Floridians opted to keep justices Renatha Francis and Meredith Sasso on the seven-member court, the state’s highest. Gov. Ron DeSantis appointed Francis in August 2022 and Sasso in May 2023.
Francis received 5,960,465 yes votes to retain her and 3,478,027 no votes to reject her, according to the Florida Division of Elections. Sasso got 5,822,995 yes votes and 3,518,990 no votes. Both received more than 60 percent of voters’ support.
In Florida, Supreme Court justices face a statewide retention vote in the first general election after they are appointed by the governor, providing the election is more than a year after their appointment. It’s a system that has been in place since in the 1970s.
No justice has ever been voted out, which requires only a simple majority. Once retained, justices serve six years before facing another retention vote.
READ MORE: Abortion access is on the ballot in Florida. So are two justices who voted against it
Did not want Amendments 3 and 4 on ballot
Francis and Sasso were the only two of the seven justices who dissented in the court’s opinion to allow Amendment 3, the constitutional amendment legalizing recreational marijuana, on the November ballot.
Francis and Sasso also dissented over allowing Amendment 4, the constitutional amendment legalizing abortion until viability and thus overriding the state’s six-week abortion ban, on the November ballot. Florida Supreme Court Justice Jamie Grosshans joined them in their dissent.
In both cases, however, a majority on the Florida Supreme Court approved the two constitutional amendments, paving their way to get on the ballot.
DeSantis had previously nominated Francis, a member of the conservative Federalist Society, for the state Supreme Court in 2020. But the Court ruled she didn’t meet the bare minimum requirement: 10 years as a member of the Florida Bar.
Francis, 47, the first justice of Jamaican descent, was admitted to the Florida Bar in 2010 and graduated from the now-defunct Florida Coastal School of Law, a for-profit law school in Jacksonville that closed in 2021.
Sasso, 41, also a member of the Federalist Society, was admitted to the Florida Bar in 2008 and graduated from the University of Florida law school.
This story was originally published November 5, 2024 at 8:25 PM.
