Florida Pot Push Burns Out, Other Petitions Too & Iguana Culling - Top 3 Takeaways - February 2nd, 2026
Takeaway #1: No Pot, Just Toe Stubbing
Maybe it’s just me but it seems rather appropriate that an effort to “legalize” recreational marijuana, something that’s federally illegal and thus can’t be legalized at the state level (because of that pesky constitution thingy), has resulted in an investigation into a nearly statewide ballot petition fraud ring. As Florida’s Attorney General James Uthmeier said on X late last week: "Earlier this week, our prosecutors went to Broward County to investigate multiple instances of petition fraud by Smart & Safe Florida and its affiliates. We have already opened a half dozen new criminal investigations since yesterday and anticipate opening dozens more over the coming days". The Smart & Safe Florida PAC’s efforts have lived up to their deceptive name this time around. PACs pushing for proposed constitutional amendments usually do come with ridiculous names designed for marketing purposes for the lowest common denominator voter. For example, remember the failed Draft Kings & Fan Duel push for a constitutional amendment? Their PAC was one of my favorite to date...”The Florida Education Champions”. Right, because...what companies who want as many people gambling on sports as possible, as frequently as possible, and with as much money as possible are really interested in is education. Though some will likely take exception to this... “Smart & Safe Florida” is almost as absurd. There’s nothing “smart” about the recreational consumption of marijuana – nor is consumption of THC ever a “safe” thing –let alone when it’s commonly smoked. While on topic, there are no shortage of studies on this – however the most recent from the National Institutes of Health on the proliferation of marijuana use through state sanctioned measures found this... Cannabis consumption has consistently been associated with a modest increase in the risk of traffic accidents (25%-97% more likely), intoxication with cannabis and cannabinoids (THC, THC/CBD extracts) increases disinhibition, and impairs verbal memory, other memory components, learning, attention, attentional bias, and psychomotor function, there is a causal link between cannabis use and a reduction in motivation. Early onset of cannabis use and frequent use in early adolescence are associated with lower educational achievement. Regular cannabis use is associated with more depressive symptoms, and heavy cannabis use by youth and young adults predicts an increased risk of major depression. A robust association between cannabis use and the risk of a psychotic disorder. THC has been associated with pulmonary injury. But otherwise – it’s great, and it can be “Smart and Safely done” just ask the PAC. Anyway, after coming up about 4% short of passing two years ago. The PAC appears to have come up well short of obtaining legal signatures and petitions for their pot push this time around. February 1st was the deadline for signatures to qualify this year and following the rampant fraudulent signature collections and petitions (more on this in today’s Q&A), it appears you’ll still have to stub your toe, or at least pretend to have stubbed your toe, or something like that, to access state sanctioned, though still federally illegal pot products and that’s because it appears that there will be...
Takeaway #2: No citizen-led proposed amendments
This midterm election year. As of Friday, the Florida Division of Elections showed the recreational marijuana push 96,470 signatures short of where it needed to be to be considered before the Florida Supreme Court. That’s a total that was only about 23,000 higher than the previous week. Meaning that it’s all but certain that they fell short of the total that’s needed given that they only had a day or two to come up with the balance of the signatures legally...which as we’ve seen with this PAC, has been a consistently problematic thing. In total there were 20 citizen-led efforts for proposed constitutional amendments attempted for this year’s cycle. Other than the pot push, non others came close. That means that for now there are only two proposed amendments on this year’s ballot – both passed by the Florida legislature in last year’s session. All eyes going forward will be on whether there’s company in the form of meaningful property tax relief stemming from this year’s state session (and likely special session to address the topic in April).
Takeaway #3: Iguana culling
It remains to be seen whether Florida’s coldest temps since January of 2010 – which we experienced yesterday and are waking up to again today – will have meaningfully culled the invasive iguana population that’s proliferated throughout South Florida the past two decades. But the prospects of the cold weather providing an opportunity to meaningfully reign in their populations prompted FWC to temporarily amend the law for transporting the large lizards. As an invasive species it’s illegal to transport iguanas, but on Friday FWC signed an executive order allowing for people who can’t safely or humanely kill stunned iguanas on their property to be able to take them to the FWC instead. The hope is to maximize the opportunity for significant culling to occur. The five locations included two on Florida’s east coast...The FWC’s offices in Tequesta, Sunrise and Marathon in the Keys. All transporting the creatures to FWC are to wear gloves and place them in closed containers – lest the resilient lizards bounce back to life in your car which would be a remarkable and incredibly dangerous thing to see...