10 Big Legal Issues in 2025

By Jim Turner, The News Service of Florida

TALLAHASSEE — Numerous big Florida legal issues are pending in state and federal courts as 2024 ends. Here are 10 legal issues to watch in 2025:

— BOOK BATTLES: Publishers, authors and parents have filed federal lawsuits stemming from a 2023 state education law and school-district decisions that have led to removing books from school libraries or to restricting access. The lawsuits allege First Amendment violations, while the law’s backers say it helps remove sexually inappropriate material.

— CAMPUS CLOSURES: After COVID-19 temporarily shut down university campuses in 2020, lawsuits were filed in Florida and across the country arguing students should receive refunds of money they paid. The Florida Supreme Court is weighing a lawsuit filed against the University of Florida over fees paid for services such as transportation, health care and athletics.

— GUN AGE: The 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals is considering a Second Amendment challenge to a 2018 Florida law that prevents people under age 21 from buying rifles and other long guns. The law, challenged by the National Rifle Association, passed after the mass shooting at Parkland’s Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School that killed 17 people.

— MEDICAID ELIGIBILITY: A federal district judge heard testimony this summer in a class-action lawsuit about people who were dropped from Florida’s Medicaid program after the end of a federal public-health emergency declared because of the COVID-19 pandemic. The lawsuit alleges the state did not properly inform people before dropping them from the program.

— REDISTRICTING FIGHT: In a case that centers on the overhaul of a North Florida congressional district, the state Supreme Court is looking at the constitutionality of a redistricting plan that Gov. Ron DeSantis pushed through the Legislature in 2022. Voting-rights groups went to the Supreme Court after the 1st District Court of Appeal upheld the plan.

— SOCIAL MEDIA PLATFORMS: Florida and tech-industry groups continue to battle in federal court about a 2021 state law targeting major social-media platforms. The law, in part, prevents platforms from banning political candidates from their sites. It passed after platforms blocked then-former President Donald Trump after the Jan. 6, 2021, storming of the U.S. Capitol.

— SOCIAL MEDIA RESTRICTIONS: State lawmakers this year passed a high-profile measure that seeks to prevent children under age 16 from opening social-media accounts on some platforms — though it would allow parents to give consent for 14- and 15-year-olds to have accounts. Tech-industry groups are challenging the law on First Amendment grounds.

— STOP WOKE: The 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals heard arguments in June in a battle about a 2022 Florida law that restricts how race-related concepts can be taught in state universities — a law that DeSantis dubbed the “Stop WOKE Act.” The state appealed after a district judge issued a preliminary injunction, ruling the law violated First Amendment rights.

— TRANSGENDER LAWS: The 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals is considering a challenge to a Florida law that bans Medicaid coverage for transgender people seeking hormone therapy and puberty blockers to treat gender dysphoria. It also is weighing a law that prevents minors from starting to receive such treatments and adds restrictions for adults seeking the treatments.

— WETLANDS PERMITS: Florida and the federal government are appealing a U.S. district judge’s ruling in a dispute about permitting authority for projects that affect wetlands. The ruling sided with environmental groups and vacated a 2020 decision by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency that shifted permitting authority from federal officials to Florida.