But neither provided grounds to reinstate Warren, providing DeSantis a authorized victory.
DeSantis communications director Taryn Fenske referred to as it “a win for the governor and a win for the people of Florida.” Nonetheless, Hinkle’s 59-page order finds fault with the actions of DeSantis and his employees, in addition to with the case and details they delivered to trial.
“The record includes not a hint of misconduct by Mr. Warren,” Hinkle wrote. “So far as this record reflects, he was diligently and competently performing the job he was elected to perform, very much in the way he told voters he would perform it … the assertion that Mr. Warren neglected his duty or was incompetent is incorrect.”
Although Hinkle found no wrongdoing on Warren’s part, he concluded it was a state matter.
DeSantis’s decision to suspend the twice-elected prosecutor in August alarmed many who saw it as an overreach by the governor. One of Warren’s attorneys called it “a political hit job.”
The popular Florida governor — who sailed to reelection in November and is widely considered a potential 2024 presidential candidate — justified the suspension by saying Warren didn’t have the right to “refuse to enforce Florida law.”
The Tampa area prosecutor said he was being punished for exercising his right to free speech. Earlier in the year, he signed two pledges written by Fair and Just Prosecution, an organization that advocates for reform-minded prosecutors. In one pledge, prosecutors vowed not to “criminalize reproductive health decisions.” The second statement made similar vows regarding people seeking transgender health care.
Warren, who was the first witness in the five-day nonjury trial in late November in Tallahassee, said the issue went beyond him.
“As I’ve said from the beginning, there’s so much more at stake than my job,” Warren said at a news conference the morning the trial began. “We’re not just fighting to do the job that I was elected to do, I’m fighting for the rights of voters across Florida to have the elected officials of their choice.”
In his testimony at the trial, Warren said the pledges he signed were never put into action or adopted as official policy. Two assistant state attorneys in Warren’s office backed up that assertion, testifying that they did not consider the statements a reflection of actual policy. But Warren’s chief of staff said he thought the pledge upholding abortion rights was tantamount to a policy directive.
In announcing the suspension, DeSantis also pointed to Warren’s decision not to prosecute 67 protesters arrested for unlawful assembly during demonstrations over the murder of George Floyd by Minneapolis police in 2020.
Warren was also instrumental in helping formerly incarcerated people regain their voting rights after DeSantis signed into law restrictions to a voter-approved constitutional amendment allowing them to register to vote. The prosecutor also created a conviction review office to examine innocence claims.
DeSantis blasted such actions as these of a “woke” prosecutor.
The trial provided a rare look inside the inner workings of DeSantis and his staff. Evidence and public records showed that the governor’s office was excited about the “totally free earned media” that resulted from the news conference where he announced the suspension. Careful staff tabulations estimated that the governor, who was running for reelection at the time, earned media coverage worth $2.4 million.
Testimony also showed that while DeSantis said he had asked his staff for a report of any prosecutors deemed to be “taking the law into their own hands,” the focus was on Warren from the start.
Larry Keefe, a former U.S. attorney in Florida whom DeSantis named as the state’s “safety czar,” testified that he consulted with a few Republican state attorneys and sheriffs, as well as Tampa area GOP donors, but did not conduct an extensive investigation.
During the trial, Warren’s attorneys asked members of DeSantis’s employees what the governor means when he calls folks “woke.”
“To me, it means someone who believes that there are systemic injustices in the criminal justice system and on that basis they can decline to fully enforce and uphold the law,” said Ryan Newman, DeSantis’s general counsel.
Newman added that “it would be the belief there are systemic injustices in American society and the need to address them.”