TALLAHASSEE — For years, Gov. Ron DeSantis has had the Legislature largely at his beck and call.
But if there’s one area where DeSantis likely won’t get everything he wants before leaving office, it’s gun rights.
DeSantis has been more supportive than Florida’s legislative leaders of allowing open access to firearms. Florida law has little to show for it.
DeSantis has repeatedly offered support for open carry. He has ripped Florida’s bump stock ban and previously said that if he was governor at the time, he would not have signed the sweeping bill lawmakers passed after the 2018 Parkland shooting that included multiple gun-safety provisions.
That bipartisan bill, signed by then-Gov. Rick Scott, prohibited people under age 21 from purchasing long guns and enacted “red flag” laws in Florida, which allow courts to temporarily take away firearms from someone they think may pose a threat.
DeSantis in November hinted on a radio show that the Legislature may soon allow open carry, telling the host that “you may get” it in the upcoming session and to “stay tuned.”
But such an idea of allowing people to carry guns in plain view in public seems likely to fail yet again.
“The governor, while he personally supports it (open carry), he hasn’t flexed political muscle for gun rights like he has for other issues,” said Luis Valdes, Florida director of Gun Owners of America.
In the last two years, the Senate, under former President Kathleen Passidomo, declined to take up multiple Republican-led bills to loosen gun restrictions. The new Senate president, Ben Albritton, may continue that trend.
He said in November that he stands with law enforcement in opposing open carry and also noted in December that he has a concealed carry permit and carries his firearm most days.
“They oppose it, I trust my law enforcement officials, and that’s where I stand,” Albritton said.
Albritton also said an idea to allow people under 21 to buy rifles was “due real caution.”
Lawmakers in 2023 did pass a bill allowing people to carry a concealed gun in public without any training or permit. Gun rights advocates criticized the bill as not going far enough.
Florida is one of five states — including Illinois, Connecticut, New York and California — that bans open carry in nearly all circumstances. New Jersey also bans the open carrying of handguns, according to the gun safety research group Giffords. Florida is the only red state in the group.
Pinellas County Sheriff Bob Gualtieri, an influential law enforcement voice in Tallahassee, is a longtime opponent of open carry. He said he has spoken with Albritton about his stance.
People carrying guns openly puts those individuals carrying them at a tactical disadvantage that’s dangerous, Gualtieri said.
And he said Florida’s “very broad, liberal policy” that allows for individual firearm possession negates the need for open carry.
“The Second Amendment, which I strongly support, isn’t an unbridled right,” Gualtieri said. “There can and there should be reasonable restrictions.”
Florida allows open carrying weapons in certain circumstances, Gualtieri said, like to and from fishing or to and from hunting.
While open carry seems dead on arrival this year, it’s less clear how other gun issues will fare.
Bob White, the chairperson of the Republican Liberty Caucus of Florida, said he met with Albritton toward the beginning of 2024 and again around May, shortly after the legislative session ended. White said the Senate leader “may very well be open to things” like allowing college students to be armed on campus.
Former Rep. Joel Rudman, R-Navarre, filed an open-carry bill ahead of the 2025 session. But he already is out of office, after he resigned to run for Congress, with his resignation effective on Jan. 1.
Still, Rudman said that the bills are “bigger than one individual.”
Rudman’s sweeping bill also proposes allowing guns at polling places and allowing college students to carry guns on campus.
His bill also would repeal Florida’s “red flag law.”
Incoming lawmaker Rep. Monique Miller, R-Palm Bay, recently said on a radio show that she has filed an open carry bill, saying her bill is “real” and that she is “not going anywhere.”
Gualtieri, a Republican, said people who demonize risk protection orders “don’t know what they’re talking about.”
He said the law successfully saves lives and has due process built into it to ensure people are being treated fairly.
Sen. Randy Fine, R-Brevard County, has also filed a bill to allow 18-, 19- and 20-year-olds to purchase rifles, repealing part of the post-Parkland legislation package.
Fine, who is also running for Congress, will leave his seat on March 31, partway through the legislative session, but said he has “ample time” to pass his bills.
Romy Ellenbogen is a Tallahassee correspondent, covering state government with a focus on criminal justice and health. Reach her at rellenbogen@tampabay.com.
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