Laws demanding race-based state action are unconstitutional, Florida AG declares

Florida

Laws demanding race-based state action are unconstitutional, Florida AG declares

'Racial discrimination is wrong,' Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier writes

Alex Nitzberg Fox News

Published

January 19, 2026 1:37pm EST

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Florida Attorney General James Uthemeier issued an opinion in which he declared that state laws that call for race-based discrimination are unconstitutional and will not be enforced by his office.

"Racial discrimination is wrong. It is also unconstitutional. Yet Florida maintains several laws on its books that promote and require discrimination on its face," Uthmeier asserted in the opinion.

"The question of law presented here is: Are Florida laws that mandate discrimination based on race by giving preferences to certain racial groups, using race-based classifications, or employing racial quotas, constitutional? In short, the answer is no. Any laws requiring race-based state action are presumptively unconstitutional under the Fourteenth Amendment's Equal Protection Clause and Article I, section 2, of Florida's Constitution," he noted.

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FILE - Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier speaks at a campaign rally for former Virginia Republican gubernatorial candidate Winsome Earle-Sears at the Buckland Farm Market on Oct. 29, 2025, in New Baltimore, Virginia. (Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images)

"As Attorney General, I and my office must honor the U.S. and Florida Constitutions' guarantee of equal protection under the law. Because enforcing and obeying these discriminatory laws would violate those bedrock legal guarantees, those laws are unconstitutional," he noted. "My office, therefore, will not defend or enforce any of these discriminatory provisions."

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Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier on Monday, April 14, 2025. (Joe Burbank/Orlando Sentinel/Tribune News Service via Getty Images)

Uthmeier's opinion was issued on Monday as Americans mark the federal holiday that honors Martin Luther King Jr., the iconic civil rights leader who was assassinated in 1968.

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis appointed Uthmeier to serve as the state's attorney general last year.

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Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis speaks during a news conference announcing an audit of Broward County's spending, at the FDOT District 4 office in Fort Lauderdale, Fla., on July 22, 2025. (Amy Beth Bennett/South Florida Sun Sentinel/Tribune News Service via Getty Images)

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Uthmeier had previously served as the governor's chief of staff.

Alex Nitzberg is a writer for Fox News Digital.

Laws demanding race-based state action are unconstitutional, Florida AG declares