Opinion: Legislator's policies likely to result in frivolous lawsuits

In a functioning Florida Legislature, state Rep. Randy Fine, R-Palm Bay, would be an outlier. In this Florida Legislature, he’s dangerously mainstream.

Like Republicans in other states, Florida lawmakers claim that public education’s main problem is not a shortage of teachers and bus drivers or helping students who fell behind during the pandemic. No, the problem is school districts forcing an LGTBQ agenda on children and parents.

The Florida Legislature passed the so-called “don’t say gay” bill (HB 1557) to address that imaginary problem. A similar law (HB 7) prohibits teachers from discussing race while mentioning racism. No evidence supported either bill. Randy Fine didn’t stop when the session ended. He remains unburdened by facts.

The lawmaker sent a letter Aug. 11 to Commissioner of Education Manny Diaz, asking the department to investigate “an alleged sexual assault between a ‘transgender girl’ and another girl” at Johnson Middle School in Melbourne. Fine said the attack occurred in a bathroom.

The attacker, Fine claimed, had been “taking advantage of the open bathrooms policy” advocated by Brevard School Board members Misty Belford and Jennifer Jenkins. Fine has feuded with both board members, especially over their support for a mask requirement.

That word again: ‘Woke’

Because Belford and Jenkins were under pressure “to justify their ‘woke’ open bathrooms police,” Fine wrote, “I have zero confidence that this alleged assault will be investigated openly.” He warned that “politicians and bureaucrats are already working overtime” to resist any investigation.

School district officials denied the claims. There was no record of a complaint. Fine said only that “multiple parents” had approached him.

Several days ago, after a three-week investigation, Melbourne Police said it found “no evidence” to support Fine’s assault claim. Rather than acknowledge that he was wrong, Fine pivoted.

His letter, Fine claimed in an email exchange with the Sun Sentinel Editorial Board, “exposed a cover-up of a ‘transgender’ sexual assault.”

How can there be a cover-up of an incident that didn’t happen?

Fine then stated that the parents “had the wrong school.” The “sexual assault,” he said, happened at Space Coast High School. Fine added, “That’s what happens when parents ask questions to their school district about a ‘transgender’ sexual assault they’ve heard about, the bureaucrats refuse to tell them anything, and parents start talking to each other.”

But that second “sexual assault” claim also is false. Sheriff’s investigators found insufficient evidence for criminal charges related to the incident at the high school.

Ideally, Melbourne Police would bill Fine for the wasted three weeks. His 2019 financial disclosure showed a net worth of $24 million. He can afford it.

The wider problem is that Fine embodies the ongoing strategy by too many Republican politicians nationwide to discredit public education. A recent Gallup poll showed that 14% of Republicans have “a great deal or quite a lot of confidence” in public schools. That’s down 20 points in two years.

Polls show support for not teaching about gender identity in grades K-3, a key part of the “don’t say gay” law — but no such teaching was taking place. Similarly, polls show support for “parents’ rights” in schools. But Florida parents always have had rights. Now, they can sue school districts if they believe those rights were violated.

Imagine the frivolous and nuisance lawsuits that will result if parents like Fine refuse to believe the truth.

— South Florida Sun Sentinel