By james art 
The governor’s political future also hinges at least in part on keeping the propositions below the 60 percent each needs to pass.
Gov. Ron DeSantis spent the election focused almost exclusively on two of the nation’s most expensive election campaigns, throwing millions of dollars in taxpayer money and numerous dubious claims against legalizing marijuana and restoring abortion rights in Florida.
Groups spending on Amendment 3, which would allow recreational marijuana, and Amendment 4, which would expand access to abortion, have raised more than $225 million in the past two years, putting them at the forefront of more than 150 ballot propositions that would be presented to American voters on November 5.
Television, radio and digital platforms are ablaze with ads in the closing hours of the campaign. The governor and first lady Casey DeSantis have been central players in the late campaign, making daily appearances in recent weeks scuttling Amendments 3 and 4.
The governor’s political future also hinges at least in part on keeping the proposals below the 60 percent support level each needs to pass. If the measures pass, DeSantis’ influence could suffer in his final two years at the helm of Florida. He is term-limited and will leave office in January 2027.
DeSantis takes on Trump on marijuana
Former President Donald Trump supported the marijuana initiative that DeSantis is now trying to derail. DeSantis also took fire for mobilizing state resources to kill both measures, which made it to the ballot only after collecting about 1 million signatures from Floridians.
“No matter what your position is on this, this is still a democracy, and in a democracy we don’t spend taxpayer dollars up front on a political issue,” said Republican state Sen. Joe Gruters of Sarasota, a former Florida GOP chairman who supports Trump.
Gruters said he opposes the abortion-rights measure, but derided DeSantis’ spending of the amendment as “propaganda.”
The Amendment 3 campaign estimated that $50 million in taxpayer money was spent by the governor against the measure, paying for 13,000 TV spots, 5,000 radio ads and more. The campaign said the public dollars going to DeSantis’ anti-abortion rights efforts undoubtedly exceed that figure.
According to an analysis by OpenSecrets, a nonprofit political money-tracking site, the marijuana amendment has raised $125 million from both parties, with $93 million from Trulieve, the marijuana giant that backs it. It is the most expensive ballot in the nation.
Backers of Florida’s Amendment 4 contributed $110 million, far more than the $10 million raised by opponents. That could make it the second-most expensive proposition in the country to go before voters, according to data from OpenSecrets.
But campaign spending reports are a snapshot in time, especially so close to Election Day when the dollars are still flowing.
The DeSantis administration is unfazed by the criticism
Still, the DeSantis administration is unfazed by criticism for directing taxpayer money against issues that many of those same taxpayers helped put on the ballot.
“Critics say it’s inappropriate, that it’s unusual to do this. I would say it’s the state’s responsibility to educate people to know what they’re voting for,” Lt. Gov. Jeanette Nunez said during a recent appearance in Clearwater.
The governor has spent virtually no time campaigning for Trump, U.S. Sen. Rick Scott or other Florida Republicans on the ballot. Instead, DeSantis has been traveling the state, for example, with doctors who oppose Amendment 4, arguing that it has multiple flaws.
The measure would repeal the state law banning most abortions after six weeks of pregnancy, which DeSantis pushed through a unanimous Republican-controlled Legislature. If approved by voters, Amendment 4 aims to restore Florida’s roughly 24-week standard for nearly five decades before the U.S. Supreme Court overturns Roe v. Wade in 2022.
But DeSantis says Amendment 4 lacks definitions — even though a majority of the Florida Supreme Court upheld the ballot language. He also says he will allow abortion at any time and for any reason. This is misleading because Florida law determines fetal viability.
DeSantis also warned that any health care professional could perform an abortion if the measure passes, although Florida law separately requires doctors to perform the procedure.
While he was vague about what Amendment 4 would allow, DeSantis took issue with whether the measure should even be on the ballot. His State Department, which oversees state elections, recently released a 348-page “preliminary” report alleging fraudulent signatures helped put the proposition on the ballot while petition gatherers were illegally paid for each signature.
DeSantis’ efforts have echoes of election denials
With the release of the report, clearly designed to undermine support for the abortion measure, some critics heard echoes of Trump’s election denials, which the Republican presidential nominee re-enforced with baseless allegations of voter fraud in the Pennsylvania battleground.
DeSantis’ fight against Amendment 3 includes claims that pot smoking would be widespread and public in Florida. The governor failed to note, however, that state smoking laws already impose some restrictions and that the Amendment 3 campaign supports the Legislature to impose more restrictions if the measure passes.
“We’re seeing more and more campaigns with exaggerated claims, patently false claims or outright lies,” said Aubrey Jewett, a political scientist at the University of Central Florida. “This seems to be increasingly standard operating procedure.”
Jewett said DeSantis appears to have adopted the tactics of Trump, who wrecked his bid for the Republican presidential nomination but whom DeSantis has since endorsed.
DeSantis “is willing to push the boundaries of what is legal and push the norms that have existed in Florida politics and in American politics,” Jewett said.
“He said he will use every lever of power at the governor’s disposal to push his agenda to the limit. And he did. Using state resources to fight these two ballot amendments is just the latest example,” he added.
Claims that Amendment 4 is on the ballot deceptively fit this Trump-like pattern, voting rights advocates say. The signatures were verified by election supervisors and the measure was certified for a vote by Secretary of State Cord Byrd, a DeSantis appointee, in January.
“Undermining the integrity of elections seems to be part of the GOP’s rules,” said Brad Ashwell, Florida director of All Voting is Local, a nonpartisan national voting rights organization. “Common themes we see are complaints that non-citizens are voting, that there are people on lists who should not be present, and that the vote counting machines are not reliable or have been hacked in some way.
“It appears to be a top-down coordinated message,” he added.
John Kennedy is a reporter in the USA TODAY Network’s Florida Network metropolitan bureau. He can be reached at [email protected] or X at @JKennedyReport.