A package of bills advancing through the Florida Legislature would empower the governor and Cabinet to designate groups as “domestic terrorist organizations” based on secret evidence, and allow a new government surveillance force to investigate Floridians who express opinions the state determines are “a threat” to the interests of “this state and the United States of America.”

The legislation, which has come under fierce criticism from civil rights and free speech advocates, represents another expansion of Florida’s security apparatus under Gov. Ron DeSantis, who has opened pop-up immigration detention centers, re-established the Florida State Guard – of which he is the commander in chief – and created an investigative unit to probe alleged election crimes, all to the tune of at least three-quarters of a billion dollars, according to a Florida Trib analysis of state spending records and contracts.

This largesse has not just funded a remarkable expansion of police powers but also funneled hundreds of millions of taxpayer dollars to state vendors, including Republican political donors.

Amy Keith, executive director of Common Cause Florida, a progressive democracy watchdog group, questioned why state lawmakers want to erect what appears to be a parallel national security network. 

“Does anybody want an amateur CIA surveilling them at the state level? That should terrify every American,” Keith said. 

“This is not the actions that citizens of a democracy expect from their government,” she added. 

The bills are gaining ground at a time when citizens protesting immigration raids in Minneapolis have been met with violent force, with officers killing two U.S. citizens, whom federal officials labeled as “domestic terrorists” after the fact. President Donald Trump meanwhile has ordered his administration to crack down on what it’s described as “left-wing terrorism.”

In Florida, critics have repeatedly questioned the need for the state’s expansion of specialized military, police and prison powers in recent years, forces they fear are ripe for abuse. 

DeSantis called for reactivating the State Guard as a way to supplement civilian work, like disaster response, and the state has since poured more than $170 million into the agency, which has become highly militarized. A federal judge recently called the state’s claimed evidence of high rates of petition invalidity in citizen-ballot initiative campaigns – compiled by the new state Office of Election Crimes and Security – “junk science.” And Florida’s construction of pop-up immigration facilities has drawn down the state’s emergency funds by hundreds of millions of dollars, while the promise of federal reimbursement has evaporated.

Those experiences haven’t so far slowed the push to give Florida officials new surveillance powers.

Bill targets actions, views and opinions

Under a bill known as HB 945, Florida residents and groups “whose demonstrated actions, views, or opinions are a threat or are inimical to the interests of this state and the United States of America” could be labeled “adversary intelligence entities” and find themselves the target of a new statewide counterintelligence and counterterrorism unit within the Florida Department of Law Enforcement.

The proposal has sparked concerns from First Amendment advocates and lawmakers in both parties – criticisms that bill sponsor Republican state Rep. Danny Alvarez has acknowledged. 

“This is going after terrorists, nation-state bad actors, not political speech,” Alvarez said. 

Lawmakers and civil society groups have pointed to the federal government’s history of surveilling, infiltrating and disrupting activists and government critics in the name of national security.

“I think about things like COINTELPRO,” said state Democratic Rep. Michele Rayner, referring to the 1960s-era federal surveillance program that targeted the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. and other civil rights activists, as well as critics of the Vietnam War.

“The concern is that there are no guardrails that I see in this bill to ensure what federal, what judicial oversight looks like. There’s no guardrails in this bill to mandate warrants being necessary,” to execute a search, she added.

After facing questions from colleagues in both parties at a recent committee hearing, Alvarez said he intends to amend the language “related to opinions.” 

“I’m going to strip everything that makes you question it,” Alvarez told his colleagues of his bill. “You just have to trust me to get to the next committee.”

“These are not normal actions of law enforcement. And it’s not the place of Florida state law enforcement to be undertaking these actions,” Keith, of Common Cause, said.

“It should make everybody very uncomfortable to give this package of power to the executive of a state,” she added.

A global digital forensics company takes interest

According to legislative records, Cellebrite Inc. is the only corporate entity with a lobbyist registered on HB 945. Free speech and privacy advocates have raised questions about the global digital forensics company’s apparent interest in the surveillance bill. According to state records, HB 945 is the only bill the company has a registered lobbyist on during this year’s legislative session.

Questioned by reporters, Alvarez said no other entities were involved in the drafting of his counterintelligence bill, including Cellebrite. A lobbyist for Cellebrite said the same, saying the company is monitoring the legislation but hasn’t taken an official position.

The Israel-based company’s services have been used by more than 7,000 law enforcement agencies and intelligence organizations around the world, providing tools that allow investigators to extract troves of text messages, photos and location data from phones and other devices, overriding password protection and encryption and even accessing deleted files. 

Maria Villegas Bravo, an attorney with the national advocacy group the Electronic Privacy Information Center, said it appears Cellebrite is eyeing state-level counterintelligence as a “new market” for its technology, in what she described as a “surveillance industrial complex.”

Law enforcement officials, including in Florida, have touted the capabilities of Cellebrite’s tech in helping investigate school shooting threats and child predators. Civil society groups have found the company’s tools have also been used by repressive governments in Russia, China, Myanmar and elsewhere, leading to what human rights advocates say is a growing list of reported abuses of the technology to target activists, protestors and journalists.

A growing state security industry

The DeSantis administration’s vast spending on pop-up immigration detention facilities, the creation of the election crime investigative force and the re-establishment of the State Guard have proven to be a cash cow for private contractors, some of whom are political contributors. 

According to state records, among the largest payouts was $92 million to the portable bathroom company Doodie Calls, to handle human waste from the Everglades detention center known as “Alligator Alcatraz.”

The firm IRG Global Emergency Management has been paid out more than $60 million, after donating $10,000 to the Republican Party of Florida just days after DeSantis administration officials announced plans for the makeshift facility. The same day the company made the donation, it inked a multimillion-dollar contract to build a “staff village” at the detention center.

The company CDR Health Care has been paid out more than $5 million, according to state records, and an associated company, Lemoine CDR Logistics, has received more than $7 million. The companies are led by Carlos Duart, a major Republican donor who along with his businesses have given millions of dollars to political committees for DeSantis, Trump and other Republican candidates, according to federal records.

A ‘constitutional trainwreck’

Alvarez’ proposal is part of a package of legislation that critics have labeled “police state” bills, including SB 1632, a measure that would allow the head of the Florida Department of Law Enforcement, the governor and the Florida Cabinet to designate groups as “domestic terrorist organizations” and threaten people who “provide material support” to the groups with criminal prosecution. 

Republican state Sen. Erin Grall, who’s sponsoring the bill, said organizations can’t be designated terrorists “on a whim,” but must meet the state’s definition of carrying out a violent act or an act “dangerous to human life” that is intended to “influence the policy of a government by intimidation or coercion,” among other factors. No previous criminal conviction is required to warrant the designation.

“I think we should all have the ability to meet, express opinions, advocate for our causes,” Grall said. “I think the criteria in here to meet the designation is a high bar, and it should be.”

Bobby Block, the executive director of Florida’s First Amendment Foundation meanwhile called the bill a “constitutional trainwreck” and a “direct threat to free speech.”

“The First Amendment draws a very bright constitutional line. Government may punish criminal acts. It may not police ideology, belief, political association or speech,” Block said. “Even promotion of really bad ideas – promoting ideas of violence – is protected speech.”

The bill also bans the use of state funds to support a designated terrorist organization, and bars private schools from accepting money from people associated with a designated group, if the school receives taxpayer-funded student vouchers. 

Students at public colleges and universities who “promote” a designated group would be “immediately expelled” under the bill, though promotion isn’t defined – raising concerns that something as simple as a social media post or attendance at a rally could warrant expulsion.

A related bill, SB 1634, would exempt from public records certain documents and findings used to justify the terrorism designations, leaving the public – and designated organizations – in the dark about what warranted the label. 

Bills raise fears among students, Muslim communities

The bills have raised particular alarm among Muslim Floridians.

All three members of the Florida Cabinet, who along with the governor would vote on domestic terrorist designations recommended by the head of FDLE, have questioned whether the state’s universal school voucher program – which lets students get taxpayer-funded scholarships to pay for private school, regardless of family income – can be used at Islamic schools. 

Ameena Popal is a ninth grader at Hifz Academy in Tampa, one of the schools that Cabinet members have singled out for scrutiny. The 14-year-old traveled to the Capitol to defend her school and urge lawmakers to vote no on the bill.

“My school teaches American government. We are taught the separation of powers, due process and the protection of religious liberty under the rights of the First Amendment. Those principles are not just mere abstract ideas,” she said. “If the goal is public safety, then legislation should rely on clear criminal standards, judicial findings and narrowly tailored enforcement mechanisms, not just executive designation alone.”

Ultimately, critics fear the bills will be weaponized by a state administration that has shown itself willing to aggressively push the boundaries of executive power – and wield it against political rivals.

“The United States Congress has declined to create a domestic terrorist organization designation list. There is a reason for that: First Amendment and due process concerns,” said Democratic state Sen. Tina Polsky. “Americans have the right to join groups and hold views, even if the government hates those views.”

Kate Payne is The Florida Trib’s state government reporter. She can be reached at kate.payne@floridatrib.org.