A Trump-loving state senator and a Harris-supporting peer pushed back Tuesday on Gov. Ron DeSantis’ assertions that Florida lawmakers would be powerless to regulate legal pot if voters approve Amendment 3 next week, saying they’ll be able to pass laws banning smoking weed in public.
State Sens. Joe Gruters, R-Sarasota, and Shevrin Jones, D-Miami Gardens, said Tuesday in Orlando they don’t agree on much, but they back legalizing marijuana and think a bipartisan coalition in the Florida Legislature would pass common-sense regulations if the ballot amendment passes.
The unlikely pair was joined by Kim Rivers, CEO of Trulieve, the medical marijuana company that has put more than $140 million into supporting Amendment 3. If approved by 60% of voters on Nov. 5, adults 21 years and older could possess up to 3 ounces of marijuana for personal use.
Their tour seeks to counter DeSantis’ campaign warning that legal pot would stink up the state with marijuana smoke, and Amendment 3’s ballot language would leave officials powerless to stop it.
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Television ads from the group Vote No on 3 have raised the prospect of a pot-smoking, free-for-all with weed smoke drifting through restaurants, theme parks, stadiums and playgrounds.
Gruters disagreed, saying he will push for regulations like banning public smoking and implementing a “zero-tolerance” policy toward smoking and driving. He said he intends to file a bill banning smoking at beaches, parks, sidewalks, restaurants and bars.
“We’re in a unique position where we can set those guardrails up, make sure we do this the right way, the Florida way, and ultimately, everybody wins” said Gruters, a former chairman of the Florida GOP who backs former President Donald Trump.
DeSantis, the state’s two-term Republican governor, sees it very differently. He has been urging voters to reject the amendment, which he did again Tuesday at an event at a Catholic high school in Clearwater.
“We already have safe and regulated marijuana in Florida, it’s called medical marijuana,” DeSantis said. Noting that nearly 1 million people have medical marijuana cards, he asked, “Do you think all those people with medical marijuana cards have a debilitating illness? No, it’s not even close.”
Much of the debate over Amendment 3 has boiled down to legalese in the ballot initiative’s fine print.
Amendment 3 supporters point to language that, “nothing in this amendment prohibits the Legislature from enacting laws that are consistent with this amendment,” which they say allows for regulations. But opponents say the ballot initiative doesn’t contain explicit restrictions on where and how marijuana could be smoked. Instead, the initiative reads that “the non-medical personal use of marijuana” won’t be “subject to any criminal or civil liability or sanctions under Florida Law.”
Florida law doesn’t allow medical marijuana to be smoked in public, and lawmakers have prohibited smoking in most public and private businesses.
Rivers, who leads Florida’s largest medical marijuana company, said Amendment 3 doesn’t grant Floridians a constitutional right to smoke weed wherever they want, and lawmakers would be free to regulate it robustly.
“All of a sudden are we going to completely lose control of our ability to govern? I think not,” she said.
Amendment 3 has divided conservatives. ֱ President Donald Trump has endorsed it, but DeSantis is adamantly opposed. On the Democratic side, Vice President Kamala Harris vowed to legalize marijuana at the federal level if she’s elected president.
Jones, a Harris supporter, called on DeSantis to change his position.
“If Florida really calls itself a free state, allow people to be free to do what they want and allow the Legislature to be the ones to create the rules,” he said.
The lawmakers also said that if the pot amendment passes, they would be open to exploring other legislation, such as allowing Floridians to grow their own marijuana, something not allowed under Amendment 3, and creating a legal pathway for people to clear past low-level marijuana convictions from their criminal record.
Orlando Sentinel staff writer Jeffrey Schweers contributed to this report.
