TALLAHASSEE, Fla. – As budget talks remain stalled, House Speaker Daniel Perez said Tuesday the House has offered possibilities including a “lean, critical-needs budget with minimal spending and no tax cuts.”
But in a quest to lower state spending, the Miami Republican described a proposal by Gov. Ron DeSantis to send $1,000 checks to homeowners as an “irresponsible idea.”
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With 97 of the 120 House members attending a brief session to extend the potential end date of this year’s legislative session, Perez said the House continues to make offers to the Senate about a tax package and a budget that must be completed by the July 1 start of the 2025-2026 fiscal year.
Perez has called for reducing the state’s sales-tax rate but indicated Tuesday he is more focused on reducing spending. DeSantis, meanwhile, has pushed for property-tax cuts.
“The sales-tax cut was a means, not an end,” Perez said. “We will embrace any and all ideas that curb the state budget. We must stop leveraging Florida’s future needs by overspending on today’s wants.”
Perez later told reporters that he doesn’t think lawmakers are at risk of a government shutdown but also noted the talks aren’t “any closer than we were a few weeks ago.” The House passed a resolution that would allow the session to continue as late as June 30.
The Florida Democratic Party issued a statement about the “continued failure to agree on a budget.”
“Florida Republicans continue to act like spoiled children,” said Florida Democratic Party Chair Nikki Fried. “With less than 50 days until a state government shutdown, Speaker Perez and President Albritton can’t even agree on a total budget number, much less the details. Their inability to pass a budget is an embarrassment to this state and an insult to the people they were elected to serve.
“While the Senate is on vacation and the House is wasting taxpayer dollars on a half hour trip to Tallahassee, Florida’s affordability crisis is hurting the people of this state. Florida Republicans need to stop wasting their time with political games and get back to work. It’s past time for them to do their damn jobs.”
Perez said the House won’t be “intimidated” or “bullied” by the Senate or DeSantis. The governor, who has veto power, last week exacerbated a session-long feud with Perez by saying a sales-tax rate reduction would kill any opportunity to cut property taxes and that it would be “dead on arrival” if included in a bill.
“Members, I know that all of you are tired, some of us are sick, and I’m sure some of you are thinking: even if we are right, wouldn’t it be easier to stop fighting?” Perez told House members Tuesday. “It would be. Giving up is always the easier path. After all, we could put the blame for the problem on past legislatures, and push the responsibility for solving it onto future legislatures. And while that may be easy, it would also be wrong.”
The annual session was scheduled to end May 2 but had to be extended because the House and Senate did not agree on a budget. Perez and Senate President Ben Albritton, R-Wauchula, indicated on May 2 that they had reached a “framework” that would include $2.8 billion in tax cuts, including reducing the sales-tax rate.
But behind-the-scenes talks blew up last week, with Perez accusing Albritton of backing out of the agreement on the budget framework. That has left unresolved budget “allocations,” which determine how much overall money will go to areas such as education and health and human services. Allocations need to be set before conference committees can begin formally negotiating details of the budget.
In a memo Friday, Senate President Ben Albritton, R-Wauchula, said senators raised concerns that a cut in the sales-tax rate would not be “meaningful, felt, or seen by families and seniors when compared with other available options.”
The Senate last month pitched a plan that included providing a sales-tax exemption on clothes and shoes valued at $75 or less. The Senate plan also included sales-tax “holidays” and trimming a tax on commercial leases.
Amid the standoff, Perez said the House has made offers, including the “lean” budget proposal. He said that would “bank all the extra money into reserves. While not an ideal solution, it would represent a hard break from recent spending practices and push the issue into next session.”
Other offers, he said, included eliminating the 2 percent tax on commercial leases, eliminating the communications services tax, eliminating gross-receipts taxes and increasing exemption levels for the corporate income tax. He framed each idea as being part of efforts to reduce state revenue.
Perez ruled out DeSantis’ call to provide a one-time $1,000 rebate to homesteaded property owners that would serve as a prelude to asking voters in 2026 to lower property taxes.
“These checks do not actually lower tax rates. These checks do not solve the property-tax problem,” Perez said. “They are just state taxpayers apologizing for local-government spending, which is the kind of irresponsible idea I associate with California policymakers.”
Perez also has criticized DeSantis for not providing a detailed property-tax plan, as local governments and school districts rely on property taxes.
House Minority Leader Fentrice Driskell, D-Tampa, pointed to a lack of explanation about how services would continue to be funded if property taxes are cut or eliminated.
“Just eliminating property taxes would be devastating, because it would be defunding the police, defunding fire, defunding our teachers,” Driskell said. “The Republicans would be putting our local governments between a rock and a hard place, for sure.”
