Ballot initiative mechanics in Florida

This page covers Florida's specific rules. For the general mechanics, see how ballot initiatives work. Florida's citizen process is constitutional-amendment-only: there is no path to propose or repeal a statute directly by initiative.

Florida's process

A sponsor must first register as a political committee formed specifically for the initiative, and may sponsor only one statewide petition per election cycle. Before circulating anything, the committee submits the ballot title, summary, and full amendment text to the Division of Elections for review.

The signature threshold is 8 percent of the votes cast in the last presidential election, calculated both statewide and within at least 14 of Florida's 28 congressional districts. For the 2026 cycle that works out to 891,523 valid signatures. All signatures must be verified by February 1 of the general election year, with county supervisors given up to 30 days to verify results and forward them to the Secretary of State.

Florida enforces its single-subject rule strictly: the Florida Supreme Court can and does remove measures from the ballot for violating it. Once a sponsor collects 25 percent of the required signatures, spread across at least half the congressional districts, the Attorney General must automatically ask the Supreme Court for an advisory opinion covering single-subject compliance, the ballot title and summary, and facial validity under the U.S. Constitution. A required financial impact statement, prepared by the Financial Impact Estimating Conference, is now folded into that same review and appears on the ballot alongside the amendment.

Deadlines and numbers

• Signature threshold: 8 percent of votes cast in the last presidential election, statewide and in at least 14 of 28 congressional districts (891,523 signatures for 2026)
• Early Supreme Court review trigger: 25 percent of required signatures, across at least half the congressional districts
• Signature verification deadline: February 1 of the general election year
• County supervisor verification window: up to 30 days

Where to go

• Division of Elections initiatives portal: dos.elections.myflorida.com/initiatives (also mirrored at constitutionalinitiatives.dos.fl.gov)

Rules

Florida is worth naming plainly: this is not a general-purpose initiative process. It can only amend the state constitution, never pass or repeal an ordinary statute, which pushes every citizen-driven policy fight into constitutional language and invites the stricter judicial scrutiny that comes with amending a constitution rather than passing a law. The automatic Supreme Court review at the 25-percent mark is unusual among initiative states and means legal vulnerability gets tested well before a campaign finishes collecting signatures, not after.

This dossier did not find a specific flat filing fee charged by the state to register a sponsor committee. The costs identified are per-signature verification fees paid to county Supervisors of Elections (around 10 cents per signature or actual cost), not a single upfront fee. It also could not independently confirm the final 2026 status of proposed sponsor-bond requirements (including a $1 million bond floated in 2025 legislative proposals). Anyone building a Florida campaign should confirm both of those directly with the Division of Elections before budgeting. For strategic help, see /engage.