Jacksonville spent $75,000 on a hologram of their Democrat mayor greeting airport visitors in multiple languages.
Now DeSantis is forcing every county in Florida to show how they'd cut 10% of their budget before they can spend a dime.
Local officials just realized what he actually did to them.
What the Law Actually Does
The first bill, HB 1329, is a transparency hammer aimed directly at local governments that have been hiding their bloated budgets in plain sight.
Starting now, every county and municipality in Florida must post detailed budget information online – department expenses, debt obligations, capital projects, all of it.
That includes a quarterly report listing every government employee's name, title, and salary.
Every. Single. One.
The part that's making local officials sweat is the mandatory budget-cutting exercise.
https://twitter.com/GovRonDeSantis/status/2069934935931019692?s=20
Before they can adopt a final budget, local governments must now identify specific ways to reduce proposed spending by 10% without touching essential services – and post those findings online for every taxpayer to see.
Chief Financial Officer Blaise Ingoglia said it plainly at the signing ceremony in Bradenton: "Government is never going to right size itself – it's going to have to come from the taxpayers."
He's right.
The second bill, SB 4F, closes a separate loophole.
Under the old rules, local governments used a complicated income-growth formula to quietly raise property tax collections without technically raising tax rates.
That's gone now.
If a local government wants to collect more than the rolled-back rate – the amount needed to generate the same revenue as the previous year – they need a two-thirds vote from their governing body.
Democrats called the new requirements "redundant" and complained about the burden of posting government salaries online.
That tells you everything you need to know about whose side they're on.
Why This Is Part of Something Much Bigger
This didn't come from nowhere.
For the past year, Florida's Department of Government Efficiency traveled county by county, auditing local budgets and publishing what they found.
Ingoglia's team flagged $275 million in wasteful spending in Jacksonville alone – a city where the budget ballooned 61% since 2019 while population grew just 10%.
Orange County: $300 million in excessive spending.
https://twitter.com/GovRonDeSantis/status/2069869438006894930?s=20
Flagler County: a budget that grew 120% over six years while the population grew less than 30%.
The specific examples were impossible to defend.
Jacksonville spent $75,000 on that Mayor Donna Deegan hologram at the airport.
Broward County spent $900,000 on DEI training since 2020.
Pensacola spent $150,000 on a theater management contract that brought drag performances to the city stage.
Orlando spent $460,000 counting trees.
Now DeSantis has placed a constitutional amendment – "Save Our Homes from Excessive Property Taxes" – on the November 2026 ballot.
If voters approve it with 60%, it would eliminate most residential property taxes for Florida homeowners.
The state Senate analysis projects $8.4 billion in annual property tax relief.
Local governments are claiming the sky will fall.
But here's what they won't tell you: DeSantis just finished his fourth straight year of cutting state-level spending – during inflation, during massive population growth – while local governments were busy paying for holograms and tree counts.
The Blueprint Every Republican Governor Should Be Copying
The transparency laws DeSantis signed Wednesday are a trap for every local official who's been spending recklessly while hiding behind procedural complexity.
https://twitter.com/GovRonDeSantis/status/2069813613540569096?s=20
When voters can see every department budget, every employee salary, and a mandatory list of proposed cuts – and local officials are still demanding tax increases – the political math changes completely.
That's exactly how a year of DOGE audits in Florida built the predicate for a property tax elimination amendment.
Expose the waste, make it impossible to hide, then ask voters if they want to keep paying for it.
Florida taxpayers in November will have a chance to answer that question directly.
Based on what Ingoglia's team has uncovered – $2.4 billion in wasteful spending across just a handful of counties – the answer seems pretty obvious.
Sources:
- Executive Office of the Governor, "Governor Ron DeSantis Signs Legislation Protecting Taxpayers and Increasing Local Government Accountability," Florida Governor's Office, June 24, 2026.
- "DeSantis Signs Bills Targeting Local Government Spending, Property Tax Increases," News4Jax/News Service of Florida, June 24, 2026.
- Chief Financial Officer Blaise Ingoglia, "CFO Ingoglia Announces Over $275 Million in the 2025-2026 City of Jacksonville Budget as Excessive, Wasteful Spending," Florida Department of Financial Services, June 8, 2026.
- "Florida CFO Says Orange County Budget Includes More Than $300 Million in Wasteful Spending," Florida Daily, May 22, 2026.
- Washington Times, "Standing Up for Taxpayers: Ron DeSantis Puts Florida's Property Tax on the Chopping Block," May 27, 2026.
- Executive Office of the Governor, "Governor Ron DeSantis and CFO Blaise Ingoglia Highlight Excessive Local Government Spending Uncovered by Florida DOGE Audits," October 1, 2025.
