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ByAccountabaloney

2025 Florida Legislative Session Recap: Budget Breakdown & Education Update

The only bill the Florida Legislature is constitutionally required to pass each year is the state budget. They failed.

As the 2025 Legislative Session officially ended on Friday night, the House and Senate were still billions of dollars apart in their budget negotiations. The good news? All pending policy bills died at midnight.

The Legislature will reconvene on May 12 for an extended session focused on the budget and related conforming and implementing bills. Also on the agenda: Senate President Ben Albritton’s $200 million “Rural Renaissance” initiative (SB 110). This extended session is scheduled to end by June 6 and is expected to cost taxpayers roughly $50,000 per day.

What This Means for Public Education Advocates

You now have just about a week to meet with your legislators while they’re back in their home districts. This is your opportunity to:

  • Push for restoration of performance funding for advanced high school programs like Advanced Placement, Dual Enrollment, and Career & Technical Education.
  • Advocate for a PreK–12 budget that prioritizes public education and—at a minimum—keeps pace with inflation.

Take action: Make phone calls, send emails, and visit your legislators’ local offices.

A Session That Felt Far from Normal

Florida Politics described the 2025 session as “a rollercoaster” and “far from normal.” They asked, “What is ‘normal’ now as DeSantis gets even closer to terming out?”

Or, as Dianne Roberts of the Florida Phoenix put it in her sharply worded column, “Florida Republicans are eating their own”:

“Florida’s elected representatives are fighting like weasels in a sack.

The Senate versus the House; the House versus the governor; the governor versus everybody.

They’re so furious they can’t even see straight.”

Legislative Session by the Numbers

  • 68 bills died in messaging
  • 1,900+ bills filed
  • 250+ passed both chambers
  • 24 Education-related bills passed

The legislature passed a bill banning Fluorida in the water supply but was unable to pass proposals lowering the gun purchase age and rolling back child labor protections. This is a recap of the bills I wrote or spoke about this session.

Bills That Passed

✅ School Start Time Repeal (SB 296 / HB 261)
Lawmakers repealed a 2023 law that would’ve mandated later start times for middle and high schools by 2026. That decision now returns to local school boards—a win for districts concerned about bus logistics and staffing.

✅ Holocaust Remembrance Day (SB 356)
Sen. Berman’s bill passed unanimously in both chambers.

🚨 Education Train Bill (HB 1105)
Sen. Danny Burgess called HB1105 an “amazingly big education train.” It included

  • HB 123 / SB 140 provisions making it easier to convert public schools to charters (parent-only voting) – but (gratefully) NOT the language micromanaging school districts’ ability to purchase or dispose of real property
  • A ban on cell phone use in elementary and middle schools
  • A high school cell phone ban pilot study

Florida Politics gave charter schools an “Honorable Mention” for their wins this session.

Bills That (Thankfully) Died

  • HB 1483 (Valdes): Attempt to modify the school grade scale. Made it to an omnibus (HB 1267), passed the House, but stalled in the Senate.
  • HB 1009 (Daniels): State motto bill with Christian Nationalist/Project Blitz ties. Passed House, not heard in Senate.
  • Additions to Required Instruction (F.S. 1003.42): This is a statute that charter schools are exempt from and imposes onerous reporting requirements coupled with punitive compliance measures on district managed public schools.
    • Cursive Writing (HB 921): Passed House, died in Senate
    • “Baby Olivia” pro-life embryology language in HB1255: Removed before HB 1255 passed
    • In the end, the only change to Required Instruction was adding standards for instruction on the “elementary principles of agriculture.”
  • SB 244 / HB 855 (Fine / Tramont): Would have barred undocumented students from Florida’s colleges. Never heard in committee; withdrawn when Fine left for U.S. Congress.

Big Win: Book Ban Bill Stopped

HB1539 (Bankson): aimed to rewrite the definition of pornography and “harmful to minors” in public schools by removing protections for works with literary, artistic, political, or scientific value. The bill, which had 14 co-sponsors including Rep. Kim Daniels, passed the House 81-29. The Senate companion, SB 1692 (McClure), passed one committee and then died in Education PreK-12. Kudos to Florida Freedom to Read for their tireless advocacy in defeating this censorship-driven legislation.

Missed Opportunities

❌ SB 166 (Simon): Deregulation Bill
This strong, bipartisan K–12 deregulation proposal passed the Senate unanimously but was never heard in the House. We hope Sen. Simon and his colleagues continue this important effort in the future.

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