TALLAHASSEE — With little discussion, Gov. Ron DeSantis and the Cabinet approved an emergency rule on Friday, the 25th anniversary of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, spelling out how Florida designates groups as terrorist organizations.
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The rule establishes the process for imposing the designation, which was part of 2026 legislation (HB 1471) that is being challenged in court.
“We’ve obviously been keen on this issue for a long time,” DeSantis said. “This provided an appropriate framework, where the state can take action appropriately to be able to defend the people of Florida against hostile actors and terrorist groups.”
The rule change was announced Thursday and approved in a teleconference call. It establishes that the state’s Chief of Domestic Security, currently Florida Department of Law Enforcement Commissioner Mark Glass, will notify the governor and Cabinet of plans to designate an organization as a domestic or foreign terrorist organization.
“I know there are imminent dangers to public health, safety, and welfare due to increasing risk from foreign and domestic terrorist groups and the emergency procedure under construction and consideration is fair in these circumstances because it is narrowly tailored and limited to addressing the identified danger,” Glass told DeSantis and the Cabinet.
Attorney General James Uthmeier, Chief Financial Officer Blaise Ingoglia and Agriculture Commissioner Wilton Simpson, all up for election in November, did not comment during the meeting, which took just over two minutes on Friday morning.
DeSantis started the meeting by honoring the people who died while rescuing others during the 2001 attacks in New York City, Washington, D.C. and over Pennsylvania and noting “that we have enemies in this world and the people that perpetrated that attack had a very clear political and ideological agenda, and that threat has not been extinguished.”
On July 1, the first day the new law took effect, DeSantis declared his intention to label the Council on American-Islamic Relations, the Muslim Brotherhood, and the anti-fascism movement known as antifa as terrorist organizations. DeSantis also proposed the designation for more than 90 foreign organizations already listed as foreign terrorist organizations by the U.S. government, including the Venezuelan crime syndicate Tren de Aragua, Mexican drug cartels, and the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps of Iran.
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CAIR quickly filed a lawsuit in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Florida in Tallahassee, contending DeSantis is violating the First Amendment and the due process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.
The legislation was approved in the Republican-controlled Legislature by votes of 80-25 in the House and 25-11 in the Senate.
Other provisions of the law bar a court from enforcing any provision of a religious or foreign law, with an emphasis against the Islamic code known as Sharia law, and require college students who “promote” terrorist organizations to be expelled.
The law defines “promotion” as when a student’s actions can be “reasonably interpreted” as an actual threat of violence; disrupt the learning environment; infringe upon the rights of others; or offer “material support for or the recruitment of members for such an organization.”
K-12 schools affiliated with designated terrorist organizations are also barred under the law from receiving state K-12 scholarship program money. Public universities and colleges are also prohibited from spending state or federal funds to support programs or campus activities that promote a designated terrorist organization.
Under the rule change approved Friday, any designation would become effective 30 days after publication in the Florida Administrative Register.
Groups put on the list would have seven days of being noticed to object in writing and provide documentation the organization believes would counsel against the designation.
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