A constitutional amendment that could legalize recreational marijuana in Florida will move forward ahead of the 2026 election, Florida officials announced this week.
The activist organization behind the effort, Smart & Safe Florida, argued in court that Gov. Ron DeSantis (R-FL) attempted to strike down their proposal after the amendment fell short of the 60% when Floridians voted on the measure in 2024.
In response to the lawsuit, the Division of Elections Director Maria Matthews sent the proposed amendment to the Florida Constitution directly to Florida’s attorney general on Monday, something that Smart & Safe Florida requested the division to do after state officials refused to in late October.
The DeSantis administration responded to the group’s complaint, claiming that the lawsuit should have been dismissed, along with the proposed ballot amendment.
Florida Attorney General James Uthemeir and Secretary of State Cord Byrd both argued that the lawsuit is irrelevant and should be dismissed.
Smart & Safe’s most recent lawsuit against the DeSantis administration over its recreational marijuana proposal marks their second suit this year.
The organization filed the lawsuit on Oct. 31 against the DeSantis administration, alleging it had notified Matthews and Secretary of State Cord Byrd in August that their petition to place the amendment on the ballot once again had secured more than three times the number of verified signatures required for the proposal to be placed on the ballot.
Smart & Safe then asked the officials to take the next step in the ballot initiative process, which would be to provide the organization with confirmation in order for them to proceed with the process.
Byrd did not issue a response to the organization, citing that Smart & Safe’s petition fell short of the signature threshold.
THE BALLOT INITIATIVE THAT COULD LEGALIZE MARIJUANA IN THE SUNSHINE STATE
As a result, the organization then filed a lawsuit on Oct. 19, alleging that Byrd directed state officials to dispose of roughly one-third of the signatures, citing that the organization did not provide the full proposed amendment to voters when asking them to sign.
In its petition, Smart & Safe demanded the Florida Supreme Court force the state to send the letter granting the organization permission to proceed with the ballot amendment process, alleging that Florida was purposely roadblocking the marijuana amendment by attempting to stall Smart & Safe’s proposal.
