Ron DeSantis didn’t walk into that interview with Jake Stofan to vent.
He came to deliver a verdict.
With a tone that vacillated between surgeon and statesman, he laid bare what insiders have whispered for weeks and what grassroots conservatives have now seen with their own eyes:
“The House leadership is revolting against the voters that sent them there.”
Not Washington. Not the Democrats. The Florida House—under Speaker Daniel Pérez—has turned inward, staging what DeSantis stopped just short of calling a mutiny. But the subtext was clear: this wasn’t dissent. This was sabotage.
In just a few minutes, DeSantis:
Exposed the House’s opposition to his immigration crackdown,
Called out their refusal to pass condo relief or property tax reform,
Demolished the gimmickry of their $5B sales tax plan for tourists,
And torched their attempts to undo his higher ed reforms and defund law enforcement.
He even took a direct shot at the Hope Florida smear campaign, framing it as part of a broader agenda led by trial lawyers, lobbyists, and the old Tallahassee swamp.
“If you didn’t know anything else about the House... you’d think they were all sponsored by Morgan & Morgan.”
That wasn’t an offhand insult. It was a declaration:
The Florida House is no longer aligned with its voters—or its governor.
And in DeSantis’s eyes, it’s time for the people to take it back.
🏛️ The House That Forgot How to Govern
It began with a whisper—a $5 billion tax cut proposal disguised as populism. It ended with a thud, a Senate walkout, a House in disarray, and Governor Ron DeSantis sipping espresso while watching the flames lick the hem of Daniel Pérez’s now-flammable speakership.
If it sounds like a plot twist, it’s because it is.
If it sounds like the end of a political career, it just might be.
In a legislative session defined by misfires, misdirection, and Mr. Pérez’s starring role in what can only be called Legislative LARPing, the Florida House blew its best chance to deliver anything resembling conservative reform. Instead, it produced a budget hostage situation, a fake scandal targeting Hope Florida, and a tax plan that would have handed tourists more relief than Floridians.
Then the Senate left. Literally. Adjourned. Packed up and said, “You deal with it.”
And now, Daniel Pérez finds himself alone, clutching a tax gimmick, an angry caucus, and the smoldering remnants of a fake scandal he allowed to grow—like mold in a leaky Capitol basement.
“We will not be moved!” thundered House Speaker Daniel Perez yesterday after hearing the news. Heroically—in his mind anyway—refusing to budge on a $5 billion sales tax cut that would have, among other things, gutted the state’s ability to fund anything more sophisticated than a lemonade stand.
It was stirring. It was theatrical.
And it was the legislative equivalent of drawing your sword and tripping over your own boot.
Because while the House stood tall on slogans, the Senate simply walked out.
And Governor Ron DeSantis? He didn’t lift a finger—he didn’t have to.
He won anyway.
🧃 THE “TAX CUT” THAT MASKED A POWER STRUGGLE
Let me begin with the obvious: this wasn’t really about a tax cut.
Yes, the House proposed a sweeping reduction in the state sales tax from 6% to 5.25%. It sounded nice. It made for flashy headlines. It offered Floridians the illusion that every Walmart receipt would become a monument to freedom.
But dig deeper and you find the truth:
This wasn’t a reform. It was a diversion. A fiscal landmine meant to blow up future conversations about property tax reform, conservative program funding, and structural governance.
By slashing sales tax revenue by $5 billion annually, the House hoped to:
Preempt future calls for reform by crying poverty.
Preserve status quo tax structures that favor developers and donors.
Box in the governor, whose long-term community-focused initiatives (like Hope Florida) require a stable fiscal base.
It was political slight-of-hand.
And the Senate saw right through it.
🧊 THE SENATE SAID “NO THANKS”—AND WENT HOME
In a move so blunt it could only be Florida, Senate President Ben Albritton dropped the budget in the House’s lap and left town. No vote. No compromise. Just the budget equivalent of dropping the mic and vanishing behind a velvet curtain.
Why?
Because the Senate recognized that governing means thinking five steps ahead—not five seconds into a press conference. They knew the House tax cut plan would:
Blow a hole in the budget.
Kill priorities that require targeted spending.
Lock the state into a structural bind that no slogan could fix.
All in an attempt to try to stick it to DeSantis. And so, rather than legitimize the charade, they walked away.
👔 DESANTIS, THE LAST STATESMAN STANDING
And then there’s DeSantis. Calm. Strategic. Smiling like a man who knows how this ends.
He didn’t scream. He didn’t tweet. He didn’t grandstand.
He just waited.
And now? He’s the last adult in the room.
While Pérez performs budget cosplay and Albritton practices legislative minimalism, DeSantis emerges as the one man who actually seems interested in running a state. And Floridians—along with national conservatives—are noticing.
He now gets to:
Position himself—once again— as the guardian of fiscal sanity.
Champion property tax reform, now that the House’s decoy plan has collapsed.
Support meaningful tax relief (like targeted holidays or exemptions) while preserving long-term conservative initiatives like school choice expansion, and community programs that work.
He has all the leverage and none of the blame. It’s just being the just.
🗓️ WHAT HAPPENS NEXT?
🛑 1. No Budget Has Passed
The Florida Senate has adjourned, walking away from budget negotiations without a finalized agreement.
The House remains in session, but without the Senate, it’s all sound and fury, signifying nothing. Much like Daniel Perez himself.
Florida’s new fiscal year begins July 1.
If no budget is passed by then, the state faces a government shutdown—a political nightmare that will land squarely on the Speaker’s lap, thanks to his now solitary stewardship.
📣 2. A Special Session Is All but Inevitable
There are only two ways forward:
Governor DeSantis calls a special session, (you can’t tell while reading this but I’m laughing hysterically about another special session being called)
or
Both chambers agree to return voluntarily—though the Senate clearly has little patience left for theatrics.
If a special session is required (I’m still laughing btw) I’m expecting serious negotiations to restart by mid-June, and this time, they’ll be on the Governor’s and Senate’s terms, not under the illusion of House control.
💥 3. The $5 Billion Sales Tax Cut Is Dead
The House’s flashy proposal to slash $5 billion from the state’s primary revenue stream?
Buried.
The Senate torpedoed it by simply leaving, and DeSantis gains nothing from resurrecting a gimmick that endangered his long-term agenda.
Any new tax relief moving forward will be:
Targeted, not sweeping.
Strategic, not populist.
And more likely to serve working families and state priorities, not donor-class distractions.
🧠 THE LESSON: GOVERNING IS HARD. PANDERING IS EASY.
Speaker Pérez shouted, “We will not be moved.”
But he was already standing on quicksand.
The truth is, fiscal restraint isn’t about cutting the biggest number you can find and calling it a day. It’s about balance. Prudence. And—brace yourself for this—math.
DeSantis didn’t crush the House. He let them defeat themselves.
And in the chaos that followed, he reminded Florida—and the nation—that conservatism isn’t about slogans. It’s about structure.
That’s what wins in the end.
Not the soundbite. Not the tantrum. Not the desperate tax cut to block reform.
But leadership. In the House maybe its time for a change.
What happens when the budget showdown restarts?
Will property tax reform become the next battleground?
And what new moves are coming from the DeSantis administration?
Join me for the next deep dive—because Florida is about to decide what kind of conservatism it wants:
Performative populism, or principled planning.
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It’s just getting good.
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