Lawmakers ignored the Class Size Amendment and watered down voting-rights restoration. Amendment 3 is different: the people who wrote it are the people who will carry it out.
By Joseph Jackson | TAMPA (Nov. 5, 2026)
The short version
Amendment 3 passed Nov. 3 with about 62% of the vote in unofficial returns. It takes effect Jan. 1, 2027, and no lawsuit had been filed against it as of Nov. 4. [1][2]
Undoing it takes another statewide vote with 60%, and November 2028 is the earliest one possible. A 2025 law makes a citizen petition drive nearly impossible. [3][4]
The fights that can still change what happens are the special session DeSantis promises before January, the 2027 Legislature, local budget hearings in summer 2027, and a likely lawsuit over the five-year wait for newcomers. [2][5]
Amendment 3 cannot realistically be stopped before it takes effect Jan. 1, 2027. What happens next can still be shaped: how much it cuts, which services survive and who pays the difference. Those fights take place in Tallahassee and at county commission meetings in Tampa, St. Pete and every other Florida city over the next 12 months.
A post that went viral on Threads this week told Floridians to "lean in." It pointed to the Class Size Amendment, which the Legislature ignored, and voting-rights restoration, which it diluted. The poster argued that showing up and demanding services will get Amendment 3 "amended."
The history in that post is accurate. The comparison runs backward, though, and the difference matters for anyone who wants to fight this.
Why is Amendment 3 different from Class Size and Amendment 4?
Class Size (2002) and voting-rights restoration (2018) were citizen initiatives. Voters put them in the constitution over the objections of the people who had to carry them out. Those officials then used their control of the details to shrink both measures.
Amendment 3 is the opposite. The Legislature wrote it as HJR 1F, passed it 75-26 in the House and 30-9 in the Senate on June 2, and Gov. Ron DeSantis pushed it. Gov.-elect Byron Donalds campaigned for it. [6][7]
So the Legislature has no reason to water it down. If its authors change anything in the details, it is more likely to be in the direction of more tax cuts and tighter limits on cities and counties, not fewer.
How it got on the ballot: Class Size and Amendment 4: Citizen petition; Amendment 3: Legislature (three-fifths vote)
Who carries it out: Class Size and Amendment 4: Lawmakers who opposed it; Amendment 3: Lawmakers who wrote it
What happened after passage: Class Size and Amendment 4: Diluted through definitions, funding and penalties; Amendment 3: Expected to be expanded and locked in
Main risk to the amendment: Class Size and Amendment 4: The Legislature; Amendment 3: Local governments raising money in other ways
How did Florida sideline the Class Size Amendment?
Voters approved class caps in 2002 with about 52% of the vote, before Florida required 60%: 18 students in pre-K through 3rd grade, 22 in grades 4-8 and 25 in high school core classes. [8]
The Legislature then chipped away at it for two decades: [8][9][10]
2003-2010: Phased in slowly. Compliance was measured by district, then by school, before individual classrooms finally counted in 2010-11.
2010: Lawmakers asked voters to replace the hard caps with schoolwide averages (Amendment 8). It got about 55% and failed.
2011: Fewer courses counted as "core." Virtual courses were exempted, and classes could go over the cap for students who enrolled after the October count.
2013 and 2017: "Schools of choice" were allowed to use schoolwide averages, and the 2017 law widened that. Several districts labeled every campus a school of choice.
2023: HB 633 repealed the fines for breaking the caps. [10]
The caps are still in the constitution. Without fines, many districts no longer meet them. In 2023-24, 42 choice schools and 14 charter schools in Hillsborough went over the limits. [9]
Correction to a common claim: the fines ended with the 2023-24 school year, not in 2025.
How was voting-rights restoration diluted?
Amendment 4 passed in 2018 with 64.55%. It restored voting rights after "completion of all terms of sentence," except for murder and felony sex offenses. [11]
2019: SB 7066 defined "all terms of sentence" to include every fine, fee, cost and restitution payment. DeSantis signed it June 28. [11]
January 2020: Answering DeSantis's request, the Florida Supreme Court said the amendment's wording covers those payments. [12]
May 2020: U.S. District Judge Robert Hinkle ruled the pay-to-vote system unconstitutional for people who can't pay. [13]
Sept. 11, 2020: The full 11th Circuit reversed him, 6-4. [14]
2022: DeSantis announced 20 arrests of people with felony records for voting. Several had been told by officials they were eligible, and some cases were dismissed. [15]
Today: Florida still has no statewide database telling people what they owe. The 2026 bills to create one died March 13. [16]
What worked for the other side was money and organizing. The Florida Rights Restoration Coalition raised money to pay off fines and fees, and says it cleared them for more than 44,000 people before the 2020 election. [17]
The playbook, in one list
Across both amendments and others (the 2014 land-conservation money, the 2016 medical marijuana smoking ban), Florida's Legislature has used the same tools:
Implementing laws that redefine key words
Changing how compliance is measured
Underfunding, or spending dedicated money on other things
Shrinking or repealing penalties
Friendly court opinions
Counter-amendments on the next ballot
No system to tell people their rights (no database)
Making it harder to get citizen petitions on the ballot
Those tools belong to whoever controls the Legislature. Opponents of Amendment 3 don't control it.
What are the real options to fight Amendment 3, and how likely are they to work?
Lobby the special session and the 2027 session: What it could do: Win state money to replace lost revenue, narrow the list of banned spending, keep local options; Odds: High for partial wins; When: Nov. 2026 to spring 2027
Show up at local budget hearings: What it could do: Protect specific services through tax-rate votes, fees or sales-tax referendums; Odds: Medium-high, but the state may limit it; When: Aug.-Sept. 2027
Sue over what the spending categories mean: What it could do: Settle whether libraries, parks and transit can still get property-tax money; Odds: Medium; When: After the implementing laws pass
Challenge the five-year newcomer wait in court: What it could do: Probably strike the wait, which would expand the tax cut; Odds: Moderate to win; near zero to stop the amendment; When: 2028 or later
New amendment through the 2027 tax commission or the Legislature: What it could do: Change it on the 2028 ballot; Odds: Low to weaken it; leaders want to go further; When: Nov. 2028
Citizen petition to repeal it: What it could do: Repeal; Odds: Very low; When: 2028 at the earliest
Challenge the ballot wording again: What it could do: Void the amendment; Odds: Very low; When: Now
Challenge the 5% cap on rentals and businesses: What it could do: Void the cap; Odds: Very low; When: Any time
1. The special session: where the decisions get made
DeSantis said Wednesday he will call a special session within two months, before his term ends in early January. He said it would "set the schedule for further homestead exemption." It would also keep local governments from "just doing an end run around the amendment and taxing them in other ways." [2]
The amendment leaves the Legislature in charge of the details: [5]
The banned-spending list. Property taxes can pay for public safety, education, infrastructure, natural-resource projects, debt and retirement. A seventh category covers operations and other spending that local boards approve, "except as otherwise prohibited by general law." Whether libraries, parks and transit keep their money depends on what lawmakers ban.
Workarounds. Whether cities can raise fees and special assessments to fill the gap.
Replacement money. How much state money goes to small and rural counties. DeSantis has called their shortfall "budget dust." [18]
This is where pressure can still win something. Senate President Ben Albritton campaigned against the amendment over the harm to rural counties, so rural replacement money is a live fight in the Senate. [19] Donalds has promised a funding formula for small and rural counties. [20]
What to do: Call your state House member and senator before the session. Ask about three things: rural replacement money, whether libraries and parks stay fundable, and whether local fees get banned.
2. Local budgets: where you can still show up
Starting Oct. 1, 2027, cities and counties will have less money. They can still: [5][21]
Raise tax rates. A law already passed this year (SB 4-F) requires a two-thirds vote to go above the "rolled-back" rate and a unanimous vote to go more than 10% above it.
Charge fees or special assessments, unless the special session bans them.
Ask voters for a local sales tax, which requires a referendum.
Move spending into the protected categories.
Every one of those moves raises taxes somewhere else, usually on renters, businesses and homes worth more than the exemption. That shift is the trade-off voters will fight over at the budget hearings.
What to do: Watch for TRIM notices in August 2027 and the September budget hearings. Speak with numbers: branch hours, response times, positions cut.
3. The newcomer lawsuit: the strongest legal case, but it won't help opponents
People who move to Florida after Dec. 31, 2026, get the old $50,000 exemption. They don't get the bigger one until their fifth year. A longtime Floridian who buys the house next door in 2028 gets the full break right away. [5]
U.S. Supreme Court precedent is against that kind of rule. In Hooper v. Bernalillo County Assessor (1985), the Court struck down a New Mexico tax break that only went to people who lived in the state before a set date. Zobel v. Williams (1982) and Saenz v. Roe (1999) also protect newcomers from second-class treatment. [22][23][24] The state's best defense is Nordlinger v. Hahn (1992), which upheld California's Proposition 13. [25]
The catch: a court would most likely strike the five-year wait and give newcomers the full exemption. That makes local revenue losses bigger, not smaller. A newcomer also can't sue until they're denied on the 2028 tax roll.
FMNN's legal analysis is based on precedent, not a prediction of how any court will rule.
4. A new amendment in 2028: possible, but not in the direction opponents want
The Legislature could put a fix on the 2028 ballot with three-fifths of each chamber. This Legislature is unlikely to undo its own amendment.
The Taxation and Budget Reform Commission meets in 2027 and can put amendments directly on the ballot. Its 25 members are appointed by Donalds and the incoming legislative leaders. Donalds has talked about eliminating homestead property taxes. [20][26]
A citizen petition needs 880,062 valid signatures. HB 1205 (2025) added residency, citizenship and registration rules for circulators and a 10-day turn-in deadline. A federal judge upheld it April 30, 2026, and none of the 22 active citizen initiatives made the 2026 ballot. [3][4]
5. Undoing the vote in court: very unlikely
In 2000, the Florida Supreme Court threw out an amendment after voters approved it because its ballot summary was misleading. [27] The Legislature closed that door in 2011. Now the attorney general rewrites a bad summary instead. That already happened here: Leon Circuit Judge David Frank threw out the original "Save Our Homes" wording in August, and Attorney General James Uthmeier rewrote it under court supervision. Voters approved the corrected version. [28]
What about the supporters' case?
Supporters say homeowners needed relief from soaring assessments and that local governments can find savings. Florida Realtors funded the Yes campaign. DeSantis called the result a "big win" for homeowners. [1][18] Those supporters also see a threat: local governments using fees and higher tax rates to replace the lost money. That is why DeSantis wants workarounds banned.
The bottom line
The Threads post is right that showing up works in Florida. It worked for the Rights Restoration Coalition, and it got the "Save Our Homes" ballot wording thrown out.
It is wrong about what showing up can do this time. Calls and crowds won't amend Amendment 3. Only another 60% vote can, and the earliest is 2028. Pressure can decide how much replacement money rural counties get, whether your library stays fundable, and whether your city can raise the money in other ways. Those decisions start in a special session that could be called within weeks.
FMNN will track the special session bill text. Send tips to tips@floridamannewsnetwork.com.
Related reading
From FMNN
Sources
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