The Free State Of Florida Is A Fascist Paradise

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For most of my life, I lived in Rhode Island — a state well-known for its close tie to the Mafia and its embrace of corruption at every level. More than one member of the state legislature was elected to office while incarcerated and one prominent mayor of Providence appointed himself to be the lifetime  head of the city’s new Civic Center authority before he retired. Another was overwhelmingly re-elected after going to prison for having his driver/bodyguard punish his ex-wife’s lover in an especially lewd fashion.

Despite witnessing years of outright corruption, graft, and skullduggery, nothing prepared me for Florida, where I have resided for the past 7 years. The state is in the grip of Snarling Ron DeSantis, a man who built his political career on being a bigger jackass than Donald Trump — a daunting challenge if ever there was one. But the Gooberner has succeeded spectacular and is now the prime candidate for Worst Governor In Florida History — which is saying something, considering a former governor was none other than the thoroughly despicable Rick Scott.

Terrorizing Citizens

Writing in the Florida Trident, investigative journalist Michelle DeMarco reported on the current session of the Florida legislature, which is scheduled to end on March 13, 2026. Pending in the legislature are HB 945 and SB 1712, which would create a new counter-intelligence and counter-terrorism unit within the Florida Department of Law Enforcement.

The new unit’s primary mission would focus on the detection, identification, and neutralization of “adversary intelligence entities.” What does that mean? Good question. According to DeMarco, that definition could include a “person whose demonstrated actions, views, or opinions are a threat to or are inimical to the interests of this state and the United States of America.”

Let’t think about that for a minute. Every first-year law student knows any criminal statute that is so vague that people of ordinary intelligence cannot determine what actions are proscribed is illegal and unenforceable on its face. What sorts of things are “inimical to the interests of this state and the United States of America?” Basically, anything the Goobernor or any of his brown-shirted henchmen say are unlawful.

The legislation would establish a 10-person leadership team that would oversee seven regional teams. Threats would be identified by analyzing “patterns of life,” and by “executing arrests or revealing its intent to compel a response using all counter-intelligence and counter-terrorism trade craft necessary.”

Florida To Spy On You

“This bill opens the door just slightly enough for there to be a justified major exponential expansion of state surveillance of the residents of this state,” said Senator Carlos Guillermo Smith during a hearing on the bill by the Senate Criminal Justice Committee earlier this month. Smith and Representative Dotie Joseph were the only lawmakers to vote against the bills.

A key concern, Smith said, was the “broad and vague language” in the legislation. Bobby Block, executive director of the First Amendment Foundation, said, “Grounds for surveillance could be viewpoints and opinions, and that’s not kosher.” What concerns him especially is the lack of definition and guardrails, the wide grant of powers, and the abundance of discretion contained in the legislation.

“This is not about liberty or security,” Block said. “This is about constitutional rights at the very foundation of our society, our state, and our country.” Surprisingly, these bills have bi-partisan support. Jose Alvarez, a Democrat, is a co-sponsor of the House Bill.

Have Spies, Will Travel

HB 945 has drawn the interest of Cellebrite, a Israeli digital intelligence company whose employees include veterans of that country’s elite cyber-warfare unit. It specializes in data extraction from cell phones and accessing data without the user’s knowledge. It has had multiple contracts with Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Florida state records show that many Florida law enforcement and state agencies have done business with Cellebrite as well.

Records on file with the Florida Senate also show millions of dollars in local funding initiative requests submitted over the years on behalf of Cellebrite for various projects, including those involving the Florida State Guard — a private police force that reports directly to the Goobernor, the Florida National Guard, and Florida Department of Law Enforcement.

As recently as last year, Cellebrite said it was blocking the country of Serbia from using its technology after Amnesty International released results of an investigation documenting Serbian police and intelligence authorities using Cellebrite forensic products to covertly target journalists, environmental activists, and others.

Ron DeSanctimonious visited the company’s offices in Israel in 2019 during a business development junket. It is listed as the sole corporate interest in the lobbyist disclosure form associated with HB 945.

Ideologues United

Senate Bill 1632 features the catchy title “Ideologies Inconsistent with American Principles.” It would allow the head of FDLE to designate groups as “domestic terrorist organizations.” The bill would also mandate the expulsion of students aiding an organization so designated, as well as prohibit any state funding of any kind to support such an organization or member of a designated organization, including private schools.

The bill is paired with SB 1634, also sponsored by Grall, which would enshroud the designation process in secrecy. Both measures would “put a lot of power into a very limited number of politicians’ hands,” said Amy Keith, the Florida director of Common Cause, with decisions based on language that is “discretionary and can hide the rationale.”

Shirin Sinnar, a constitutional law professor at Stanford University Law School, described the legislation as “terrifying,” because it is both a license to “go after political enemies,” and a threat to civil rights advocacy. “Advocacy is still protected speech,” she said.

The ease with which HB 945 has been moving through the legislative process is troubling, said Chip Gibbons, an advisor to both state and federal lawmakers on First Amendment issues and Policy Director for the Washington, D.C.-based Defending Rights & Dissent. “Has anyone read it?” he asked.

In The Footsteps Of COINTELPRO

Chip Gibbons, a long time researcher on free speech, questioned why state police would have counter-intelligence capabilities, and compared the push for such measures in Florida to federal counter-intelligence operations run in the United States during the 1960s and 1970s.

The FBI’s COINTELPRO was a covert counterintelligence program aimed at organizations the agency deemed subversive, including civil rights and student groups. FBI records include surveillance of “New Left” activities in Miami, Jacksonville, and even Tampa, where student activities at USF were closely monitored. Similarly, police political intelligence units or “Red Squads” were set up and collaborated with the FBI during the 1960s in the Deep South. Their purpose was to monitor and disrupt groups considered subversive.

To Gibbons, HB 945 raises serious questions about the creation of a “political police force. This is clearly an attempt to set up a counter-intelligence unit to target Floridians, solely due to views and opinions, first amendment protected speech,” he said. “It’s not really hiding the ball about what it wants to do.”

Proudly Anti-Woke

It should be noted that Florida aggressively promotes fossil fuel interests, has banned the state government from purchasing electric cars, and prohibited anyone in state government from uttering the highly provocative words “climate change.”

This is tyranny, not freedom. DeSantis and his cronies have more in common with the Taliban than democracy. One has to wonder who drafted these bills for the Florida House and Senate, because it is abundantly clear the sponsors do not have the mental capacity to dream this stuff up themselves. Someone is feeding it to them.

If you are driving, when you cross into Florida you will see a signs that say, “Welcome To The Free State Of Florida.” The absurdity of those signs should be intuitively obvious to the most casual observer. What they should say is “Welcome To Florida — Proud Home Of The Most Fascist State In America.” Considering that Texas is also in the running for that title, that honor is nothing to be proud of.