By Maurice Langston
We are truly blessed to live in Florida in this new era of freedom and economic opportunity. For too long, our state was middle-of-the-pack when it came to private enterprise. We could not boast of significant corporate headquarters and had little national prominence in the most important industry sectors. We were known for tourism and retirement, and that was pretty much it.
But today it’s a different story. Corporations are relocating, entrepreneurs are moving, and working families are looking for the freedoms we offer, whether economic, medical, or educational.
One of the most significant steps Florida has taken was to reform its badly abused lawsuit culture. Florida offered too many billboard promises, telling people they could get rich if they just hired a slick lawyer. And it was partly true. The lawyers benefited from legal structures that often rewarded enterprising plaintiffs.
That changed in 2023 with the passage of a host of reforms. Gov. DeSantis and the Florida Legislature made important changes to bad faith standards and set reasonable limits on contingency fees and one-way attorney fees, among a host of other changes. Florida was recognized across the nation for modernizing the system.
The proof is in the pudding. Florida’s insurance rates have come down, and more and more insurers are coming back to Florida, or even setting up business for the first time. Because of Florida’s consumer-friendly laws, insurers must cut rates or return profits to policyholders if their profits exceed a reasonable amount. That is exactly what has been happening, and we are all better for it.
We would be extremely foolish to undermine these positive efforts from the past couple of years. But there are special interests trying to do exactly that. We know for sure that the trial lawyers don’t like these reforms and would undo them if they could. It has cut into their bottom line, and they would like to shape the law to their own benefit.
We must hold the line and not lessen the reforms of 2023. We are headed in the right direction. Let’s keep it making progress.
Florida has made progress in leaps and bounds over the past few years in one important area: lawsuit abuse reform. For many years, our state was rated a judicial hellhole because the costs of litigation were so high, which spilled over into the regular economy and affected all Floridians, even those not directly involved in any particular lawsuit. These costs could actually be quantified and were as high as $1500 per year per Florida family.
But something truly significant happened a few years ago, when Gov. Ron DeSantis signed into law landmark legislation to update our legal system, reforming contingency fees, standards of bad faith, premises liability, and a host of other related issues. The end result is a state with a fairer judicial system that rewards those with actual damages instead of cultivating an environment where filing lawsuits is an industry to itself.
Unfortunately, those who liked the old system are now trying to turn back the clock and push us back to being a judicial hellhole. They would overturn the 2023 reforms and are actively opposing other good measures.
For instance, they are fighting a new common-sense bill that would require plaintiffs to disclose if their lawsuit is being financed by a third party. This unseemly practice is popping up all over the country, where investors are looking at lawsuits as a new way to make money and provide the equivalent of venture capital. Other states are passing laws to address this issue, and it’s one of the remaining areas where Florida remains vulnerable to lawsuit abuse.
And there’s more at stake than simple fairness. Some of the major third-party investors are foreign, with a lot of activity from China in American lawsuits. These investors often have the power to make decisions about the case, rendering the actual plaintiff as just a puppet in the pursuit of big judgments against American companies. The proposed Florida law would make this sort of activity illegal.
Now is the time to double down on our commitment to a fair and free Florida. No rollbacks to effective lawsuit reforms! And let’s pursue these other new measures, like reforming third party financing, that will create more opportunity and prosperity for all Florida residents.
Maurice Langston. is the Chairman The Florida Council for Safe Communities
