TALLAHASSEE, Fla. (WCTV/Gray Florida Capital Bureau) – The Florida Senate voted along party lines to extend a controversial emergency fund through 2027, but the House has yet to take action on the measure, with the fund set to expire Monday night.
The Emergency Preparedness and Response Fund would be extended through Dec. 31, 2027, under the Senate bill. The fund was created in 2022 and is scheduled to expire at midnight on Monday.
The fund was designed to have money set aside for the state to prepare for and respond to disasters that weren’t already budgeted for. The legislature has put more than $4.7 billion into the fund since it was created.
Democrats like Sen. Lori Berman, the party’s minority leader, said Gov. Ron DeSantis is abusing the fund by spending billions without legislative oversight. The state has used the fund to respond to hurricanes like Ian and Milton, as well as its immigration enforcement effort.
“We all know the fund has been used on purposes it shouldn’t have been used for, and we need to have oversight,” Berman said.
More Florida politics:
DeSantis has renewed his immigration emergency order nearly 20 times in the last three years, keeping the emergency fund open. Democrats like Sen. Shevrin Jones, D-Miami Gardens, call the account a slush fund for the governor.
“We are not doing the people’s money the right way when we don’t put in guardrails on how money is being spent,” Jones said.
Berman tried to amend the fund so that the governor would have to ask the legislature for more money when an emergency is extended.
“I want our governor to be able to respond quickly to emergencies, whether they’re natural, technological, neurological or man-made. But I can’t approve offering a blank check to the executive branch,” Berman said.
Senate appropriations chair Ed Hooper, R-Palm Harbor, warned senators against the amendment, saying they were gambling with Republican infighting.
“Are you willing to take that risk? That the other chamber is mad at us, that the governor is mad at somebody, and doesn’t want to deal with that amendment? I am not,” Hooper said.
The legislature has the power to end states of emergency, and Democrats filed a resolution that would end the immigration emergency. They also filed bills to limit emergency renewals without legislative oversight.
Those bills haven’t moved, with a deadline in the upper chamber for first hearings next week. Hooper said that’s potentially something for the next legislature to take up.
“There’s still ample time for them to have plenty of conversation about how this is working,” said Senate President Ben Albritton.
The House hasn’t put the fund extension on any agenda. If the fund expires, the money will go into the state’s general fund.
Copyright 2026 WCTV. All rights reserved.