Ron DeSantis seeks to dismiss a lawsuit over his suspension of Monique Worrell

By Jim Saunders ©2024 The News Service of Florida

TALLAHASSEE — Gov. Ron DeSantis is trying to end a legal challenge to his controversial decision last year to suspend Orlando-area State Attorney Monique Worrell.

State lawyers Friday filed a 25-page motion arguing that a federal judge should dismiss a lawsuit filed by two residents and the group Florida Rising Together that alleges DeSantis violated voters’ due process and First Amendment rights in the suspension.

The motion makes a series of arguments, including that the plaintiffs lack legal standing and that DeSantis did not violate federal constitutional rights with his decision.

“Obviously, it does not offend the U.S. Constitution for states to authorize suspending and removing state elected officials for neglect of duty and other misconduct or incapacity,” the motion said.

Also, the lawyers for DeSantis wrote that “for the governor’s suspension of Ms. Worrell to violate their substantive due process rights, plaintiffs would have to possess a fundamental right to see their chosen candidate remain in office once elected. But plaintiffs still cannot cite a single case (a legal precedent) for this proposition.”

Arguing that DeSantis’ suspension of Worrell “disenfranchised” voters, attorneys for plaintiffs David Caicedo and Rajib Chowdhury and Florida Rising Together filed a revised version of the lawsuit on June 28 in Orlando after U.S. District Judge Julie Sneed in May dismissed an earlier version.

DeSantis last August issued an executive order suspending Worrell, a Democrat who was elected in 2020 in the 9th Judicial Circuit, which is made up of Orange and Osceola counties. Among other things, the executive order alleged that Worrell’s policies prevented or discouraged assistant state attorneys from seeking minimum mandatory sentences for gun crimes and drug trafficking offenses.

But the revised lawsuit, which is the target of Friday’s motion to dismiss, said that in “following through on her campaign promises to reform the criminal legal system, Ms. Worrell was doing nothing other than meeting her professional and ethical obligations and exercising her prosecutorial discretion.”

The lawsuit seeks to have DeSantis’ executive order declared unconstitutional.

“Governor DeSantis abrogated plaintiffs’ associational and expressional First Amendment rights when he abused the suspension authority accorded to him under Florida law,” the revised lawsuit said.

The Florida Supreme Court, in a separate case, upheld the suspension in a June 6 decision.

Meanwhile, Worrell is again running for state attorney in the November election. Among her competitors is Andrew Bain, a former Orange County judge who was appointed by DeSantis to replace Worrell. Bain is running without party affiliation.

If the lawsuit is not dismissed, it appears unlikely the legal issues will be resolved before the election. Sneed on Monday scheduled a trial to start in May 2025, according to a court docket.