The average gallon of regular gas in Florida was up 6 cents from a week earlier, even with prices easing over the weekend as stations competed for business.

AAA put the average gallon at $4.34 on Monday, down from $4.42 on Friday, which was the highest for the state since May.

“Fortunately, oil prices moved lower last week,” AAA spokesman Mark Jenkins said in a released statement. “That could ease some of the upward pressure on prices at the pump.”

Every part of Florida was over $4, with the low of $4.04 on Monday in Escambia County at the western end of the Panhandle. Monroe County, which includes the Florida Keys, held the state high of $4.62 a gallon on Monday.

The state average is lower than the national mark of $4.48 on Monday.

“Typically, the start of autumn brings lower gas prices, but lingering volatility in the Strait of Hormuz and the high cost of crude oil are driving up pump prices,” AAA stated in a release.

AAA noted that the national average for September is set to surpass the prior September price high of $3.83 set in 2023.

Meanwhile, diesel vital to the state’s supply chain stood at $6.07 a gallon on Monday, down from $6.28 a week earlier and lower than the national average on Monday of $6.45.

Nearly 1.5 million vote-by-mail ballots have been sent to voters for the November General Election, according to figures posted Monday by the Division of Elections.

County supervisors of elections also reported Monday that more than 2,200 ballots have already been returned, mostly from voters in the military and overseas.

The early breakdown shows almost 660,000 ballots have gone out to registered Democrats, 485,000 to registered Republicans and 287,000 to those registered to a minor political party or no party affiliation.

Republicans, who currently have a 1.55 million advantage in registered voters over Democrats, typically make up the difference with in-person early voting.

In prior midterm elections, 7.8 million Floridians voted in 2022 and 8.3 million in 2018.

The last day to register to vote in the November 3 election is Oct. 5.

Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier was in Sarasota Friday to announce his office has filed a lawsuit against a construction company and its executives for allegedly scamming at least 80 residents out of at least $1 million in insurance payments over four years.

Uthmeier filed the suit in the 20th Judicial Circuit in Lee County. Named defendants are Evolve Construction and Evolve Construction & Restoration Inc. — which operate as Evolve Enterprise — and six of its executive principals. 

The AG’s office alleges the defendants used predatory contracts that left residents without protection and operated without home solicitation permits, moves Uthmeier claims violate Florida’s Deceptive and Unfair Trade Practices Act, which his office enforces.

“We’ve been able to identify over a million dollars at this point from 80 different complainants, and that number is only going to grow,” Uthmeier said during the press conference.

The Florida Phoenix called Evolve Construction at the Sherman Oaks, Calif., headquarters advertised on its website but no one answered. Phone calls to Evolve Construction & Restoration offices in  Naples, Sarasota, Orlando, and Port Charlotte offices advertised on the website also went unanswered.

Following Hurricanes Ian and Milton, Uthmeier said, individuals from the companies would go into storm-ravaged neighborhoods, knocking door to door, promising to repair roofs and search for mold.

“They stole millions of dollars of insurance money that these residents received that was supposed to go towards home repairs but, the kicker, they didn’t do the repairs. On many cases, they did not even begin the repairs. But in all of these cases, they certainly did not finish them, taking the money, running, leaving these poor residents, these victims, with damaged buildings and homes and, in many cases, liens on the property — that’s unacceptable,” Uthmeier said.

The AG said he hopes other people who have been scammed contact his office “so that we can beef up our suit even further. Take these guys to the cleaners, make sure that they are held fully accountable, and get your money back to you so that you can be made whole.”

Uthmeier was named Florida’s top law enforcement official by Gov. Ron DeSantis after he tapped former Attorney General Ashley Moody to fill the U.S. Senate seat vacated by Marco Rubio when he became Secretary of State.

To keep the position, Uthmeier must be approved by Florida voters in November. He faces Democratic challenger José Javier Rodriguez.

He used the press conference as an opportunity to praise his former boss.

“I think Gov. DeSantis has has really written a master class for all leaders when it comes to how to handle thees these disasters [hurricanes], Uthmeier said.

He praised Sarasota County Sheriff Kurt Hoffman and other law enforcement, noting, “They do Lord’s work.”

Florida’s education commissioner is directing school districts to set stricter rules for reviewing library and classroom books or face “corrective measures.”

In a seven-page memo sent Wednesday evening, Commissioner Henry Mack told superintendents and charter school leaders to continuously audit books, review their collections and remove instructional materials that contain sexually explicit material, even if a parent or county resident has not submitted a complaint in that district.

“Reactive review,” is insufficient, wrote.

“Make no mistake, the Department will hold districts, and the superintendents who lead them, accountable for failing to protect students from inappropriate content and material,” Mack added.

The Department of Education followed up with its own social media post: “SEXUALLY EXPLICIT and INAPPROPRIATE content has NO PLACE in Florida schools. Florida school districts will be held ACCOUNTABLE for failing to protect our children from this type of content. ENOUGH IS ENOUGH.”

Mack cited a recent school board meeting in Hillsborough County where parents spoke during public comment and recited passages from books in circulation they deemed inappropriate for students, including “Beyond Magenta: Transgender Teens Speak Out” by Susan Kuklin, “A Court of Wings and Ruin” by Sarah J. Maas, and “The Bluest Eye” by Toni Morrison.

“A review that remains incomplete, or that leaves parents to locate the next title, does not meet the duty required of you by statute,” Mack wrote. “Parents should not be required to place this material on the public record for district leadership to examine what is already in circulation.”

Mack wants school districts to cross-check the DOE’s official list of removed books with their own list of instructional materials and library books for review. In his memo, Mack said if a book is included on that list and was removed in another county, a district that has the same book is “required” to review it.

“Several districts, including Clay, Escambia, and Nassau, have already removed or discontinued substantial numbers of titles following review. Delaying until a district becomes the subject of the next public controversy is not an acceptable approach,” Mack wrote. 

Current Florida law says a school district can review and remove a book after a complaint has been made that a book is pornographic, obscene or isn’t age appropriate. Books can also be removed as part of a regular selection process in which a media specialist can decide to remove them if they are outdated, rarely circulated or no longer relevant to the curriculum.

School librarians and media specialists are required to go through training to distinguish which books are age appropriate and to “err on the side of caution.” The training instructs librarians and media specialists that if they would not be comfortable reading the passage from the book in a public meeting, to “lean towards” not placing it in a school library. 

The law does not explicitly require district personnel to immediately remove the book or to double check the list of already removed books in other districts for preemptive review.

Mack outlined a nine-point plan for the next 90 days for school districts to follow to improve their removals of age-inappropriate books from school shelves.

If a district does not comply, it risks losing state funds, grants, Florida Lottery money or any other funds appropriated by the Legislature.

“A process that depends on a parent discovering explicit material, reading it in a public meeting, and then forcing a district response is not only severely flawed; it is administrative neglect masquerading as either ignorance or ineptitude,” he wrote. “Whatever it may be, it is unacceptable and must end.”

 Citizens Property Insurance President Timothy Cerio encouraged policyholders to “shop the market” if their renewal notice includes a sizeable increase.

Addressing the state-run company’s Board of Governors on Wednesday, Cerio also proclaimed that “the market is working” due to legislative changes in recent years allowing it to shed policies which are picked up by private carriers.

“I don’t think we’re going to grow because it is such a robust market,” Cerio said ahead of the board meeting in Lake Mary. “They will find a home in the private market, but they should shop it.”

Cerio said Citizens’ policy count was almost at 255,000 as of Sept. 18, with $70 billion in total insured value. Three years ago, Citizens’ potential exposure was at $552 billion.

Citizens posts on its website 266,231 policies in place as of August 31, less than half from a year ago and well below the 1.4 million policies handled in September 2023, when the agency accounted for 15 percent of all policies in the state.

Currently, Citizens makes up 1.8 percent of the market.

Board Chairman Carlos Beruff said Citizens exists to absorb policies from companies that fail, but “I don’t think Citizens should exist.”

“When I joined this board six years ago, the insurance policies that we were taking in were exploding,” Beruff said. “And that was a concern for me because I didn’t want to have to tax the citizens of Florida through their policies.”

Under state law, if Citizens’ sees its surplus wiped out by a hurricane or series of storms, it can place assessments on its policyholders and policyholders in the private sector to rebuild its capacity to pay claims.

With the reduction in policies, Citizens has also reduced its workforce from 1,300 workers in 2023 to just under 900.

A key part of the recent legislative changes targeted lawsuit costs incurred by insurers, which Cerio said “really exploded” after Hurricane Irma ran up the state in 2017.

Cerio said lawsuits involving Citizens claims have decreased by 55 percent since 2023 due to the legislation.

“This is why we were able to pass along a rate decreases to consumers, and the same is true for the private industry as well,” Cerio said.

Another part of the decline is due to depopulation efforts first employed after the policy count reached 1.48 million near the end of 2012.

The effort features a “clearinghouse” where homeowners are offered to a private firm when their coverage is within 15 percent of the offer by Citizens.

The state has also benefitted by the absence of hurricanes making landfall in 2025 and so far this year, which officials have said allows some softening in homeowners insurance prices and growth in new carriers.

State leaders have long sought to hold down the number of Citizens policies, at least in part because of financial risks if Florida gets hit by a major hurricane or multiple hurricanes. Citizens was created to provide a haven for homeowners who couldn’t find affordable coverage with a private carrier, but its policy counts have fluctuated significantly, depending on private market conditions.

Cerio said Citizens is projected to end the year with about 248,000 policies, with total exposure of around $77 billion.

“This is a historical low,” Cerio said. “But I will tell you that number may wind up being much lower depending on the success of (depopulation). It’s just that our data analytics team is not willing to go there just yet.”

A new law Gov. Ron DeSantis signed this year (SB 1028) establishes a new clearinghouse for commercial policies and allows surplus lines insurers that can display strong financial strength ratings to be considered for the policy takeouts.

Surplus lines insurers are companies not licensed in Florida but allowed to operate as an “eligible” insurer.

Separate from the Citizens meeting, Florida Insurance Commissioner Mike Yaworsky on Tuesday announced that since January 2024, 48 companies have filed for a rate decrease, and 53 companies have requested no change or increase.

“I expect to see more aggressive rate cuts in the near future and going into 2027,” Yaworsky said in the release. “OIR is receiving a flood of rate decrease requests ranging from -0.3 (percent) to -19.7 (percent).”

More than $7 million is being used to prevent the commercial or residential development of three working ranches and farmlands in Polk and Putnam counties.

The deals involve conservation easements, which the Rural and Family Land Protection Program uses to allow existing agricultural operations to continue in exchange for restricting future land development.

The largest parcel, the 916-acre G-3 Ranch Addition in Polk County, has a price of $6.45 million. The pasture and row crop land includes creeks that flow into the Peace River. Polk County is expected to cover about $500,000 of the deal.

Another $750,000 is directed at the 75-acre David & Elizabeth Hunt cow/calf ranch in Polk County. The land runs along a stream that links Gator Lake to Lake Pembroke. Polk County is expected to cover $250,000 of the deal’s cost.

The conservation easement deal in Putnam County involves the Young Family Farm, an 85-acre timber tract that touches the northeastern corner of Putnam Lakes Preserve. The department lists the deal at $160,000.

The department noted that each property is located within either the Florida Ecological Greenways Network or the Florida Wildlife Corridor.

 Among the new laws taking effect Oct. 1 are changes in how police identify criminal gang members, a new penalty for those who involve minors in animal fighting, and a clarification on license plate frame rules.

The final $1 increase in the state’s voter-approved minimum wage will also take effect Sept. 30, pushing it up to $15 per hour. It’s part of the 2020 constitutional amendment spearheaded by prominent Orlando lawyer John Morgan.

Under the amendment, the minimum wage went to $10 an hour on Sept. 30, 2021, and grew by $1 on Sept. 30 of each subsequent year. Any future increases will be based on inflation.

Tipped employees will also see their base wage increase from $10.98 to $11.98 per hour on Sept. 30.

The federal minimum wage is $7.25 an hour, unchanged since July 2009. An employer of a tipped employee is required to pay $2.13 per hour in direct wages provided the tips equal the federal minimum wage.

The majority of legislation that successfully advanced out of the 2026 regular session and a series of special sessions became law July 1, the start of the current fiscal year, or upon the signature of Gov. Ron DeSantis. But some laws and provisions don’t take effect until Oct. 1.

Among the changes in state law as of Oct. 1:

TRANSPORTATION

— The pre-sales process begins for the Department of Highway Safety and Motor Vehicles to offer specialty license plates involving: Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC); Miami Northwestern Alumni Association; Outsider; St. Petersburg College; and First Responders Resiliency. (SB 246)

— Clarifying a 2025 law regarding frames placed around a license plate, the 2026 legislation allows frames if they don’t cover the primary features of the plate — essentially the letters, numbers and registration sticker. (SB 488)

FELONY REGISTRY

— A “career offender” registration is to be created similar to the sexual offender registry. The new law requires habitual violent felony offenders, violent career criminals, and three-time violent felony offenders to annually provide their address, phone number, employment, vehicles, professional licenses and immigration status to the local sheriff. Those individuals must also report changes of address, phone numbers and employment within 48 hours and have the marking “775.261,” signifying “career offender,” on their driver license or state identification card. (SB 1332)

LEWD BEHAVIOR

— Observing a child under 16 for sexual gratification, while intentionally exposing sexual organs in a lewd manner, regardless of the minor being aware of being observed, becomes a third-degree felony. (HB 1525)

ANIMAL CRUELTY

— Penalties are increased for animal cruelty, with a new third-degree felony offense for adults who involve minors in animal fighting, baiting or in sexual offenses. Children charged would have to undergo psychological evaluations and, if recommended, treatment. (HB 559)

COURT ORDERS

— Willfully violating a “no contact” court order carries new penalties, with law enforcement authorized to make a warrantless arrest when the officer has cause to believe the order was violated. (HB 397)

GANGS

— Makes it easier to categorize a person as a criminal gang member, from allowing a spouse to make the identification to accepting online admissions of gang membership and reducing the number of times a person must be seen in the company of gang members from four to two. The bill also defines the term “gang-related language” to mean any verbal or written statement that signals gang affiliation, supports gang activity, or uses recognized gang codes, symbols, or terminology associated with criminal organization. (HB 429)

DRUGS

— The manufacture, selling or even delivery of xylazine outside its allowed use as animal drug products for veterinary purposes becomes a first-degree felony. Also, selling or possessing nitrous oxide, unless for approved uses at grocery stores, becomes a third-degree felony. (HB 432)

TRASH

— Requires Broward County to conduct a feasibility study and hold a public hearing before advancing plans to expand the “Monarch Hill Landfill.” (HB 4039)

WATER MANAGEMENT

— The Fellsmere Water Control District is reduced in size from 34,441 acres to 14,090 acres and moved from an independent special district in Indian River County to a dependent district of the county. (HB 4093)

Jolly announced the decision Sunday, two days after the Donalds campaign said it had accepted invitations to three debates around the state. The campaigns had previously accepted different debate invitations but had not agreed to appear at the same event.

“It is clear, given the tenor of the current campaign environment, including Byron’s repeated lies and bad faith, that debates this cycle would not create constructive, honest conversation and only further stoke division, animosity, and bad will,” Jolly said. “That’s not something I wish to do for our state.”

Jolly said his campaign previously accepted several debate invitations that Donalds did not accept, including proposed events involving the Tampa Bay Tiger Bay Club and CBS Miami.

Donalds, meanwhile, announced Friday that he had accepted three debate invitations: a Sept. 29 event at Florida A&M University in Tallahassee, an Oct. 13 event hosted by News4Jax and an Oct. 22 debate involving Telemundo and NBC 6 in South Florida.

The Republican criticized Jolly for declining to participate after previously calling for numerous debates.

“I said 3 debates. Jolly said 12 debates. Yesterday, Jolly said no debates,” Donalds wrote Monday on social media.

Jolly responded that Donalds had earlier rejected opportunities to debate and accused the Republican campaign of attempting to dictate the terms of the debates.

“We accepted multiple debates before this week,” Jolly said. “Byron refused them and instead set his own rules by press release.”

Donalds also declined to debate his opponents during the Republican primary. At the time, Donalds argued that it was not his responsibility to provide his opponents with a platform. Jolly has cited that position while defending his own decision.

Jolly said he plans to spend the remaining weeks before the Nov. 3 election traveling Florida and meeting directly with voters.

The absence of a debate would represent a significant departure from recent Florida political history. The Tampa Bay Times reported that Florida has not held a gubernatorial election without a debate since 1974, when Democratic Gov. Reubin Askew won reelection.

The debate dispute comes as other statewide Florida contests also may proceed without candidate debates. Republican U.S. Sen. Ashley Moody has declined to debate Democratic challenger Angie Nixon, while debates have not been scheduled in several other statewide races.

David Jolly has already made it clear he’s a critic of large-scale data centers, for which Floridians continue to express disapproval up and down the state.

The Democratic gubernatorial candidate had already said that if elected in November, he’d issue a one-year moratorium on construction of these facilities. But after visiting a region of Northern Virginia this week with the highest density of data centers in the country, he says he’s seen first-hand the economic and public health disruption they inflict on communities and that it’s not what he wants to see in the Sunshine State.

“I visited a family with a home, you open the door and you’re hit with the noise pollution,” he said Friday after attending an event with Habitat for Humanity in Pinellas County. “You walk outside, you see the turbines that are fueling the energy. Down the street, there were four kids who developed respiratory conditions who had to seek medical help.”

Data centers also are deflating real estate prices in their communities, Jolly said. He learned of a home near a massive data center that sat on the market for nearly a year and ended up selling for $80,000 below list price.

“Let’s be honest about what’s happening in Florida,” he said. “Big tech, big data, the utilities are rushing into a relatively unregulated environment, or at least a favorably regulated environment. And that’s why you’re seeing voters who feel like they don’t have the economic or political power to push back, stand up, and say, ‘Please don’t do this.’

Local communities in Florida continue to say they don’t want data centers. This week, the Orange County Commission advanced a plan to temporarily ban data center development. Commissioners reached a consensus for a 6-to-18 month moratorium, depending on how long county staff need to research the potential harms, according to Orlando Weekly.

Three local governments in Florida have permanently banned construction of data centers, and 19 are pausing such development, according to FloridaDataCenters.org.

Already operating

However, 12 data centers are already operating in Florida and another eight are planned, according to Cleanview, a marketing intelligence company. The Florida Legislature approved and Gov. Ron DeSantis signed legislation earlier this year that bans public utilities from passing the electricity costs of data centers onto residential and small business customers. It also preserved local authority over zoning, permitting, and land use for such centers, and gives local governments authority to set strict standards or deny projects.

Republican gubernatorial candidate Byron Donalds has expressed support for letting local governments decide whether they want to construct data centers. He has dismissed Jolly’s one-year moratorium as “politics.”

And Donalds said in Tampa earlier this month that construction of data centers would not resemble what Jolly visited this week.

“In Northern Virginia, they built them next to apartment complexes and residential neighborhoods,” he said. “We’re not going to allow that in Florida. … If you’re going to do it, just do it a couple of miles down the road. Don’t do it in residential neighborhoods.”

Advocates for data centers say they are needed in the United States, lest this country lose the race for AI superiority to China. The strongest advocate for that position is President Donald Trump. The Bureau of Land Management is reviewing data center-related proposals covering at least 17,600 acres of public land across six states  — Arizona, Idaho, Nevada, Oregon, Utah, and Wyoming, the Washington Sun reported Friday.

Jolly says he’s perfectly fine if the other 49 states build data centers — just not Florida.

“There is no long-term economic impact from the data centers. There is the upfront construction jobs, but that there’s not the legacy economic impact that actually justifies the disruption of a community,” he said.

“Look I do think that our national policymakers do need to work through some things to the extent that it’s a national security strategy. Let the White House and the Congress figure it out. But as Florida and Florida voters, we’re saying don’t build them here, let the other 49 states build them. It doesn’t hurt our national security strategy to say no to data centers in Florida.”

The Donalds campaign did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The Byron Donalds campaign is aggressively attacking David Jolly’s plan to reduce homeowners’ insurance rates.

The Democratic candidate for governor is proposing a state catastrophic insurance fund that would remove hurricane and wind coverage from the private insurance market. He says doing so could reduce homeowners’ insurance costs by 60% to 70%.

Donalds counters on the campaign trail and in a television ad that Jolly’s plan would institute a $1,000 “hurricane tax” on Florida families.

“It’s all lies,” Jolly responded during a press conference in St. Petersburg this week when asked about the ad. He said his team has never published a detailed plan for anyone to dissect, and emphasized that “it does not include an additional $1,000 tax for homeowners. No governor is going to do that.”

The Donalds campaign cites a recently published study from Florida State University as the source of its contention that Jolly’s plan would blow a hole in Florida voters’ pockets if approved. But that FSU study isn’t based on Jolly’s proposal, but on a plan first introduced by a bipartisan pair of Florida lawmakers in 2024.

That proposal aimed to transform Citizens Property Insurance Corp. — the state-backed property insurer of last resort — by allowing all homeowners to become eligible to buy Citizens coverage specifically for wind damage.

What Jolly has proposed is a state-backed “catastrophic fund” for homeowners’ insurance, fully removing hurricane and wind coverage from the private marketplace and putting it into a state sovereign wealth fund, which he contends would substantially cut homeowners insurance rates.

He says the fund would be paid for by making insurance companies pay taxes that they now avoid, adding that fees on real estate transactions (better known as Florida documentary tax stamps) and existing tourist development taxes (TDTs), are also “on the table” to build up that fund.

Donalds said using TDT funds wouldn’t raise nearly enough money to fund Jolly’s plan, and that those funds are imposed at the county level. “I thought he believed in local control?” he said this week. “Apparently not.”

FSU study on 2025 proposed plan

The FSU study was published last month and lists potential advantages and risks for policymakers if all homeworkers used Citizens for wind coverage. Among the potential advantages: “An improved private market study and insurance solvency; Potential for lower cost of capital through public financing and greater uniformity in coverage and pricing structures.”

The negatives include: “The concentration of catastrophic risk in a single entity; Increased likelihood and magnitude of statewide assessments; Potential impact on state capital perception; Reduced competition and innovation in insurance markets; and exposure to special interest pressures in rate-setting and funding decisions.”

The FSU study also says that when the state assumes the risk of wind accounts, premiums could rise anywhere from 21% to 139%.

Donalds says it would be a government boondoggle, comparable to the federal Affordable Care Act. “Anytime the government takes over, it gets worse. The premiums get higher, and you don’t get the coverage that you were promised,” he said this week during a roundtable discussion in Indian Rocks Beach.

Jolly responds by noting that the state already has a state catastrophic fund (called the Florida Hurricane Catastrophe Fund), created in a special legislative session following the destruction wrought upon Florida by Hurricane Andrew in 1992. “Right now, that fund only reimburses insurance companies for a share of their hurricane losses. It is a bailout for insurers,” he says on his campaign website.

Jolly notes that existing state law already says that if a devastating storm or series of storms leaves Citizens in a deficit, the company can charge its own policyholders a surcharge of up to 15%, and if a deficit still remains it can charge an emergency assessment of up to 10% per year on other property and casualty policies in the state not provided by Citizens, including homeowners, renters, and those with auto insurance policies.

The FSU study was commissioned in 2025 after Broward County Republican Rep. Hillary Cassel withdrew a legislative proposal (HB 13) that would require Citizens to make windstorm coverage available to all homeowners in Florida. The proposal was originally floated during the 2024 legislative session by Cassel (a Democrat at the time) and former North Fort Myers Beach Republican Spencer Roach, and something similar was proposed by a Florida lawmaker in 2006.

“What I really find interesting is that idea that I’ve been talking about for several years, the Democratic potential nominee, David Jolly, runs on my idea,” Cassel said on This Week in South Florida with Glenna Milberg right before last month’s primary election. “So, it is the solution, it is one of the solutions for property insurance, and we as Republicans have taken that on and are studying it with the number one insurance program in the country to figure out how we can apply that across the state.”

Donalds plan

Meanwhile, Donalds unveiled his “Bring Down the Bill” property insurance package this week. Among its provisions:

• Reforming the Florida Hurricane Catastrophic Fund “by reducing an unnecessary surcharge on policyholders when the fund is strong.”
• Maintaining 2022 and 2023 legislation that that has resulted in a reduction of homeowners’ insurance lawsuits that, in turn, has helped lower insurance companies’ legal costs and resulted in lower homeowner insurance premiums.
• Restructures the My Safe Florida Home grant and other grants by directing all state agencies receiving funding for projects that benefit homeowners to “coordinate on prioritizing grants for the greatest impact on homeowners.”
• Create a “Insurer Scorecard” showing pricing, claims approval rates, denial rates, and time to payment for every carrier in Florida.
• Work on reducing the number of Citizens policies. Since 2022, Citizens’ policy count has dropped from 1.4 million in late 2023 to approximately 274,000, according to a Citizens press release in June.

“I would simply ask: Are you good with what Byron Donalds wants to continue in the state of Florida with homeowners’ insurance? ‘Cause he’s offering more of the same and transparency,” Jolly said on Monday. “Transparency doesn’t reduce costs.”

Donalds countered on Tuesday during an event in Hillsborough County that Jolly’s homeowners’ insurance plan was “a big government takeover. That is Democrat policy 101. Blame everybody else, give it to the government. Make a grand promise that you know you can’t pay for, and then by the time you’re gone from office it’s the next person’s fault.”

Gov. Ron DeSantis eventually got the Legislature to put his property tax cut measure on the ballot, but he’s not on board with a different amendment backed by GOP leaders in his party.

DeSantis on Monday evening came out against Amendment 1, which would increase the amount of money lawmakers can put into a key reserve fund. It increases the cap on the balance of the budget stabilization fund from 10 percent of the previous year’s general fund revenue to 25 percent.

“This is a foolish constitutional amendment proposal. We already have a maxed out rainy day fund and have run the largest surpluses in state history,” DeSantis posted on X. “Any additional revenue should be used for lower taxes, including assisting local governments with grants so that homestead properties can be exempt from local property tax. Surplus revenue could also be used to remove tolls once the property tax issue is settled. I recommend a NO vote.”

DeSantis was responding to a post by the Republican Party of Florida supporting the measure.

“The Florida GOP has officially endorsed Amendment 1,” RPOF’s official X account stated. “This amendment will help strengthen Florida’s rainy day fund so the state can handle storms, downturns, and other emergencies without raising taxes or raiding the budget.”

The measure also directs the Legislature to put up to $750 million into the fund each year until the 25 percent figure is reached, except in years where the reserve fund is used to help recover from a hurricane or other natural disaster or patch over a projected shortfall.

The last time the reserve fund was used was in 2008, in the middle of the Great Recession as the state faced a multi-billion dollar shortfall.

Lawmakers approved the measure (HJR 5019) in 2025, voting 100-1 in the House and 29-4 in the Senate to put it on the ballot.

Legislative leaders backed the proposal as a hedge against a severe downturn in the economy that leaves the state unable to cover critical needs without raising taxes or fees.

“This is just a preparation of being prepared for the unexpected, and none of us know what the unexpected is, but we have a sample to look at in the 2000s when we had a recession,” then-House Speaker Daniel Perez told reporters in June 2025 when the measure was moving through the Legislature. “The state of Florida was not prepared for that recession.”

Amendment 1 needs 60 percent of the vote to become law.

An average gallon of gas in Florida leapt over $4 the past week, while diesel surged above $6 for the first time ever upon renewed fighting in the Middle East.

Even with a soft decline over the weekend, AAA put a gallon of gas at $4.14 on Monday, 23 cents higher than a week earlier.

And diesel vital to the state’s supply chain,surpassed the national average over the past week, reaching $6.31 on Monday, 63 cents higher than a week earlier.

“Tensions in the Middle East intensified last week, causing oil prices to surge and increasing the cost of producing gasoline,” AAA spokesman Mark Jenkins said in a released statement. “Florida drivers are now seeing those higher costs reflected at the pump. If oil prices remain elevated, motorists could face additional upward pressure on gas prices this week.”

Patrick De Haan, head of petroleum analysis at GasBuddy, noted that since March 1, after U.S. and Israel strikes on Iran, Americans have collectively spent more than $100 billion more on gas and diesel than in the same period a year earlier.

“With gasoline prices inching up and diesel well above $6/gal and climbing, Americans will pay $418 million more on gasoline and $310 million more on diesel today vs one year ago, or nearly — $730 million combined,” De Haan posted Saturday on X.

The national average for diesel was $6.23 on Monday, 33 cents higher than a week earlier.

The national average for gas was $4.32 a gallon on Monday, 17 cents higher than a week earlier.

A year ago, an average gallon of diesel in Florida sold for $3.55 and gas was at $2.95 a gallon.

Of the state’s 67 counties, only seven, all on the Panhandle, displayed an average under $4, with a low of $3.95 in Escambia and Bay counties.

At the other end, Monroe County in South Florida had a $4.35 average on Monday, with areas of the Big Bend region topping $4.20 a gallon.

For motorists with electric vehicles, the average kilowatt-hour cost at charging stations in Florida on Sunday rounded down to 41 cents, a rate mostly unchanged since early March.