The same day Donald Trump endorsed legalizing recreational marijuana in Florida, Gov. Ron DeSantis’ staff attacked a Republican Senator with the same position.
James Uthmeier, DeSantis’ Chief of Staff, criticized Sen. Joe Gruters for endorsing Amendment 3, a ballot initiative that the Sarasota Republican endorsed back in July.
“It’s a shame that someone like Joe Gruters would support an amendment that has virtually no checks on where and how marijuana can be consumed — putting kids at risk,” Uthmeier said. “Someone should check who has given him political $ and then see who is backing this amendment.”
Gruters, a former Republican Party of Florida Chair and candidate for Chief Financial Officer in 2026, hasn’t accepted any money from the Smart & Safe campaign behind Amendment 3. He did accept $1,000 from Trulieve, Florida’s largest medical marijuana company and the largest backer of the ballot measure, for his last Senate campaign in 2022. That was a small portion of the $258,000 Gruters raised that cycle.
The Senator waved off the criticism from the Governor’s executive staff.
“I heard a Florida elected say this numerous times: When you’re over the target, they’re going to come after you,” he said, mockingly referencing a favorite quote of Team DeSantis.
DeSantis notably has come out against Amendment 3, and Uthmeier sits on the board for the Vote No on 3 campaign.
But Uthmeier wasn’t alone in hurling online jabs at Gruters from the Plaza level.
“How much has Joe Gruters, who is preparing to run for a statewide office, taken from one large marijuana corporation that has funded over $70 million towards this effort?” said DeSantis Press Secretary Jeremy Redfern. “It begs the question … What’s in it for them?”
“Follow the money! Vote no on 3,” posted DeSantis Communications Director Bryan Griffin. “It’s a corporate interest power grab on our state constitution.”
More striking than the number of DeSantis surrogates attacking a sitting Senator was the timing. All the social posts came Saturday shortly after Trump, the last GOP President and the 2024 Republican presidential nominee, posted on Truth Social that he will vote for Amendment 3.
“We need the State Legislature to responsibly create laws that prohibit the use of it in public spaces, so we do not smell marijuana everywhere we go, like we do in many of the Democrat-run cities,” Trump posted. “At the same time, someone should not be a criminal in Florida, when this is legal in so many other States.”
The DeSantis team made no public comments about Trump taking that position, instead targeting Gruters.
Gruters supports legalizing marijuana but wants to regulate public smoking, similar to Arizona.
He considered it telling that the DeSantis team would attack him for the first time on the issue six weeks after he publicly endorsed the ballot measure.
“But it doesn’t matter,” Gruters said. “None of these people liked me anyway. We are going to win anyway. It doesn’t bother me.”
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