Sign up here.<\/a><\/p>\n Graduates of ABA law schools are still eligible to take Florida\u2019s exam, but the court said it plans to extend bar eligibility to law schools approved by other federally recognized accrediting agencies \u2014 though it noted that no such agencies currently have rules specific to law schools. The court said it will contact other accrediting agencies to gauge their interest in approving law schools.<\/p>\n \u201cThe court\u2019s goal is to promote access to high-quality, affordable legal education in law schools that are committed to the free exchange of ideas and to the principle of nondiscrimination,\u201d the court said in a 5-1 ruling.<\/p>\n Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, a Republican, called the decision a \u201cgood move\u201d in a post on X. \u201cThe (highly partisan) ABA should not be a gatekeeper for legal education or the legal profession,\u201d he wrote.<\/p>\n Jenn Rosato Perea, the ABA\u2019s managing director of accreditation and legal education, said in a statement that the order \u201creinforces the authority\u201d which the Florida court has always had over lawyer licensing there, and that the ABA will continue to improve its standards and promote the benefits of a national accreditation system.<\/p>\n The Supreme Court of Texas finalized a similar plan<\/a> on January 6, saying it planned to develop its own criteria to approve non-ABA accredited law schools and allow their graduates to be licensed to practice. Ohio and Tennessee are also reviewing their ABA requirements.The states’ moves to shrink the ABA’s oversight come amid a wider conflict<\/a> between the ABA and President Donald Trump\u2019s administration, though the ABA\u2019s law school accreditation arm operates independently from the larger ABA.The association has clashed with the administration over Trump’s attacks on judges<\/a> and law firms<\/a>. In April, Trump directed the Department of Education to assess whether to suspend or terminate the ABA council as the government\u2019s official law school accreditor, citing its \u201cunlawful \u2018diversity, equity, and inclusion\u2019 requirements.\u201d<\/p>\n The U.S. Justice Department in May curtailed the ABA\u2019s longstanding role in vetting judicial nominees and in April, barred its attorneys from traveling to or speaking at ABA events, saying the organization has been engaging in “activist causes.”<\/p>\n A White House spokesperson in March had called the ABA a \u201csnooty\u201d organization of \u201cleftist lawyers,\u201d after the ABA condemned criticism of judges by administration officials. The ABA has sued the administration over canceled domestic violence grant funding and Trump’s executive orders targeting individual law firms.<\/p>\n The lone dissenter in Thursday’s opinion, Florida Justice Jorge Labarga called the state’s changes to accreditation an \u201cextraordinary step,\u201d and said Florida\u2019s reliance on the ABA has worked well since 1992.<\/p>\n \u201cI strongly believe that the best course for our legal educational system, our legal system, our profession, and above all, for Floridians is to stay the course with the ABA as the sole law school accreditor,\u201d Labarga wrote.<\/p>\n On Friday, the ABA\u2019s Council of the Section of Legal Education and Admissions to the Bar which oversees law schools voted to establish a new body to handle accreditation matters, separate from the council’s other business such as promoting best practices and convening leaders across legal education.<\/p>\n It also advanced a proposal that would limit the number of times the ABA\u2019s policymaking body, called the House of Delegates, can weigh in on proposed changes to the law school accreditation standards.<\/p>\n Taken together, those changes<\/a>\u2014 which are not yet final \u2014 would \u201creinforce the council\u2019s independent decision making and make its processes more efficient,\u201d said the ABA’s Perea.<\/p>\n Read more:<\/p>\n Texas becomes first state to end ABA role in lawyer admissions<\/a>ABA\u2019s law school division seeks greater independence amid political backlash<\/a><\/p>\n Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles., opens new tab<\/a><\/p>\n Purchase Licensing Rights<\/a> Karen Sloan reports on law firms, law schools, and the business of law. Reach her at karen.sloan@thomsonreuters.com<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Jan 16 (Reuters) – Florida has become the second U.S. state to reduce its reliance on the American…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":121658,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[19770,60851,13043,8313,18727,19771,19772,20438,19773,60852,18713,20429,19774,60854,19786,60850,19785,19783,19784,34212,48106,34213,60842,18729,28,30,29,18716,20414,60843,19776,19777,18717,3986,19778,19779,13047,19768,19781,60849,19782,60844,60853,20433,18731,60845,60846,34214,19769,60841,20412,60847,628,19780,60848,20418],"class_list":["post-121657","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-florida","tag-aceds","tag-agrc","tag-amers","tag-asia","tag-asxpac","tag-bact","tag-biz","tag-bmat","tag-bsup","tag-chem","tag-clj","tag-cmpny","tag-cmss","tag-cn","tag-destlit","tag-destoapp","tag-destogov","tag-destoleg","tag-destopub","tag-dli","tag-easia","tag-edu","tag-edutip","tag-emrg","tag-florida","tag-florida-headlines","tag-florida-news","tag-gen","tag-govact","tag-govadm","tag-inds","tag-iser","tag-judic","tag-legal","tag-legals","tag-mngiss","tag-namer","tag-nrlinogov","tag-nrlinoleg","tag-nrlpaoapp","tag-nrlpaopub","tag-pris","tag-pstcde","tag-publ","tag-reuters-legal","tag-schls","tag-schls1","tag-soci","tag-topicworld-us-florida","tag-topicworld-us-ohio","tag-topicworld-us-texas","tag-univs","tag-us","tag-usafl","tag-usaoh","tag-usatx"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/121657","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=121657"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/121657\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/121658"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=121657"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=121657"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=121657"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"Karen](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/https:\/\/s3.amazonaws.com\/arc-authors\/reuters\/7b860e76-cc6f-4f24-8a90-eb86cf0c031d.png\")
<\/a><\/p>\n