Florida has earned a reputation for pushing back against failed public health dogma and leading the way to a healthier America.
Led by Gov. Ron DeSantis and Surgeon General Dr. Joseph Ladapo, the executive branch has taken steps praised by the MAHA community: challenging widespread vaccine mandates, increasing transparency, and advocating patient choice.
Now, Florida is seemingly reversing course when it comes to championing freedom and transparency. The state Legislature is looking to pass an obscure provision in the Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services package bill that could have major consequences for free speech.
This debate comes amid a broader trend of federal and state-level efforts to shield parts of the agricultural sector from liability and scrutiny.
Florida is one of 13 states with “food disparagement” laws that give legal recourse to producers who are affected by harmful public criticism. As Florida law currently stands, producers are allowed to sue if their perishable agricultural food products are disparaged as “not safe for human consumption.”
Originally, this law was adopted to protect an industry that “constitutes an important and significant portion of the state economy.” Perishable products are uniquely vulnerable to market volatility and potential panic spread through misinformation, which may justify that narrow protection.
However, the state Legislature is considering major revisions to this law. These include broadening the legal shield to include non-perishable products and expanding the definition to include “agricultural practices used in the production of such products.” In addition, the bill authorizes damages, including “reasonable attorney fees, and costs of the action” for producers, but provides no such cover to defendants who prevail.
Punishment through process is the real danger.
These changes are not minor technical edits. They mark a clear expansion that overlaps with much of the current MAHA debate over consumer warnings, pesticides, chemical inputs, and industrial processing. Criticism of how food is produced could now be misconstrued as an accusation that the product is unsafe and leads critics to court.
Agricultural producers should be protected from baseless smear campaigns, especially when slander can destroy livelihoods and the American food supply. However, Florida can achieve that goal without obstructing good-faith debate and advocacy.
If lawmakers insist on expanding this law, they should at least add guardrails to protect free speech and deter litigation abuse.
This could include an anti-SLAPP (Strategic Lawsuit Against Public Participation) and an early-dismissal pathway for courts to screen out lawsuits aimed at suppressing free speech.
It could also include rules about balanced attorney fees, so the legal system cannot be used as a financial weapon.
The best course, however, would be to drop the proposed expansion altogether.
If the agricultural industry truly has confidence in its practices and products, it should welcome scrutiny, not seek new legal pathways to silence it.
This is bigger than MAHA: Florida has built its reputation on transparency and open debate. The Legislature should preserve that tradition by rejecting the expansion of the food disparagement law.