Lame duck DeSantis turns cool on tax cuts, leaves lawmakers holding the bag | Opinion

After relentlessly beating the drum for more than a year about a major property tax roll back that could devastate smaller cities and counties, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis did an about-face Monday that has left our heads spinning.

At a Tampa news conference, he said he won’t put his political weight behind the measure passed by the Legislature during a special session he called for that purpose.

His reason? DeSantis said the measure lawmakers approved isn’t identical to what he proposed. The proposal that goes to voters in November doesn’t cut property taxes that fund schools as he wanted.

This is vintage DeSantis: Legislators had the nerve to think on their own — even a little bit — and he’s going to punish them.

“What the Legislature did wasn’t my proposal,” he said. “We had a proposal, and I felt an obligation if that were on the ballot, to have to lead the effort.”

He added: “If someone asked me to do something, I’m not saying I wouldn’t. But in terms of leading the effort, in terms of me saying, ‘Here we go, we’re going to do this, we’re going to do all that,’ you know, I’m not going to do it.”

Voters, meanwhile, are going to get whiplash. Is the governor for or against the property tax measure that will expand homestead exemptions for primary homes to $150,000 and then $250,000? He’s the one who keeps saying homeowners are “renting” their homes because they have to pay taxes. What happened to that?

We’ve seen this sort of behavior from DeSantis before. In the last regular session in Tallahassee, DeSantis and House Speaker Daniel Perez stopped talking. That was apparently because Perez and the House didn’t agree with everything the governor wanted, such as vaccine requirement exemptions, artificial intelligence regulations and state spending. The bad blood between the two leaders made it hard to get anything done. Even passing the budget took extra time.

Now it looks like DeSantis is lashing out because the Legislature didn’t bend to exactly to his will on property taxes. The measure lawmakers approved is still very far-reaching; some local leaders, including in Miami-Dade County, have said it could devastate government budgets. But DeSantis seems to have wanted lawmakers to adopt, word for word, what he wanted, no thought required.

It’s like he doesn’t understand — or care — that the Legislature is an equal branch of government that is supposed to serve as a check on the governor’s power. We elect legislators to represent us and our best interests, not bend the knee to every single thing the governor wants.

Term limits may also be playing a role in DeSantis’ behavior. His term ends in January and, so far, there seems to have been no job offer from President Trump in Washington, though there have been rumors. According to an Axios story published in April, Trump was telling people close to him that DeSantis is “begging” for a job in the administration. DeSantis also is reportedly eyeing another run for president, in 2028.

For now, DeSantis is a lame duck with waning power. He got to flex a little muscle when he signed the $117 billion state budget and slashed some $1.6 billion from the bottom line with his veto.

But that may have been the last moment of real power the governor will be able to wield. Withholding his full-throated support for the property tax amendment may be one final attempt to gain a little leverage while he’s still in office.

Politicians who have supported the property tax measure must be wondering bitterly where this leaves them.

We don’t blame them. The chief cheerleader for getting rid of property taxes is stepping away from the fight. Without DeSantis at the helm, is this amendment doomed? And will their support of it hurt them if it goes down with a thud? November is coming fast.