A coalition of religious and anti-gambling groups are uniting to put pressure on lawmakers in the hopes of killing a proposal that would allow up to three Las Vegas-style casinos in South Florida.

The Florida Catholic Conference, the Florida Baptist Convention, Florida Family Action and Florida Casino Watch held a press conference Tuesday morning to declare war on the casino proposal, sponsored by Sen. Ellyn Bogdanoff, a Fort Lauderdale Republican whose district is dominated by Palm Beach County, and Rep. Erik Fresen, R-Miami.

Representatives of the religious groups objected to the “destination resorts” in part because, they said, gambling victimizes the poor and is accompanied by social costs such as addiction, prostitution, bankruptcy and suicide.

“This is the big Kahuna that’s been brought to the table to us. And we’ve shown up to say, ‘no thanks,’” said Rep. Dennis Baxley, R-Ocala, a former head of the state Christian Coalition. He called the casino plan “the biggest brand change” in Florida.

Florida Family Action head John Stemberger, who also heads FFA’s parent group Florida Family Policy Council, named defeating the proposal his organization’s chief objective during the legislative session that ends early in March.

Stemberger plans to use the Internet to expose lawmakers’ votes on the issue with a “Wall of Fame” and “Wall of Shame” and is asking legislators to sign an anti-gambling pledge. Stemberger achieved success with a similar campaign in 2008 when he shepherded a ballot initiative onto the ballot and into the state constitution prohibiting same-sex marriage.

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Lawyers for the state were grilled Wednesday by Leon Circuit Judge Jackie Fulford over the Legislature’s move to rewrite the Florida Retirement System and pull 3 percent payroll contributions from some 700,000 government workers.

Lawmakers were able to use the more than $1 billion from teachers, state workers and other public employees as savings last spring, helping cover what then was an almost $3.8 billion budget shortfall. The Florida Education Association and other public employee unions argued before Fulford that the change is an unconstitutional violation of collective bargaining guarantees. 

But attorneys Doug Hinson and David Godofsky, from the blue-chip law firm, Alston & Bird, representing the state, argued that past case law gives lawmakers authority to make such revisions — which they labeled a “modification.”

In an unusual move, Fulford left the bench to get a better look at slides Hinson was projecting on a courtroom viewing screen. En route to the floor, Fulford delivered a stunning message:

“I disagree with you,” she said.

Fulford, who last month ruled lawmakers violated the constitution by approving a massive prison privatization plan for South Florida in the budget — rather than a separate bill — said she doesn’t know how she’ll decide the pension case.  But she acknowledged having a “fundamental difference,” with the state’s interpretation of its authority.

Arguments continue this afternoon.

Florida’s budget hole for next year was officially put at $2 billion Thursday — and the revised forecast from state economists also put it in the red through 2015.

The shortfalls reverse what had been an optimistic forecast delivered to lawmakersonly last month — by the same analysts. But that was before the European debt crisis deepened and sent shockwaves through consumer confidence across the nation, including the Sunshine State.

Tax collections “hit a wall,” in mid-summer, said Amy Baker, head of the Legislature’s Office of Economic and Demographic Research.

Baker and other analysts told the Senate Budget Committee they have downgraded earlier state revenue forecasts by $600 million for the current year and almost $1 billion for next year. Rising program costs — especially in public schools and Medicaid — also must be layered-in, resulting in what she said would be a $2 billion shortfall facing lawmakers when they begin crafting the 2012-13 budget in January.

The Senate Budget Committee took the bad news in stride Thursday. But Chairman J.D. Alexander, R-Lake Wales, said he also feared that if the economy stumbled further, tax collections wouldfall even further off projections.

“We could have more challenging numbers,” Alexander conceded, adding, “or they could be better.”

A day after unveiling his latest seven-step themed plan – this one toward creating jobs and spurring economic development — Gov. Rick Scott turned into saleman-in-chief Thursday, pitching his plan at appearances in Jacksonville, Panama City and on talk radio.

Scott gained some additional talking points with Congress ending a deadlock that spanned two presidencies and approving a series of free trade agreements, including those with Panama and Colombia.

In his jobs’ plan, Scott highlighted the prospect of enhanced trade with Central and South America as a motive behind his push for more public works projects at Florida’s 14 deepwater sea ports.

“Free trade with Panama and Colombia will benefit Florida’s economy and businesses for years to come,” Scott said after the bipartisan vote in Congress.  “By eliminating the need to pay tariffs in order to export Florida goods and products to those expanding economies, Florida companies will now be able to invest their money in creating jobs.”

Scott on Thursday is scheduled to tour an aviation center at Jacksonville’s Cecil Field and an industrial and retail complex near the year-old Northwest Florida Beaches International Airport outside Panama City.

Gov. Rick Scott laid out the “job creation and economic growth agenda” he’s been hinting at lately — a wide-ranging plan aimed at repealing more than 1,000 state rules and regulations, reducing the corporate income tax, and pouring money into port and road projects to spur more jobs.

The Republican governor — who has promised to create 700,000 jobs in seven years — has conveniently settled on seven steps toward jump-starting Florida’s sputtering economy.

Scott unveiled the plan Wednesday morning at a metals and plastics plant in Orlando. With an election year coming, Scott also used the event to draw contrasts between his plan and the jobs proposal pushed by President Obama, now languishing in Congress after a negative vote Tuesday in the Senate.

“Unlike our elected leaders in Washington, D.C., I realize that it is Florida’s families and businesses, taking risks with their ideas, capital and time, that create jobs and grow an economy,” Scott said. “We will continue to attract new jobs by consistently lettting businesses know through our actions that we want Florida to be their home.”

Scott’s latest proposal builds on many of the themes he endorsed in his first-year as governor.

 After scaling back benefits for Florida’s almost 1 million unemployed — to reduce costs for businesses — Scott now wants to require job training for those drawing assistance. He also wants to double the corporate income tax exemption approved last year by the Legislature, an increase that would eliminate the levy for about 25 percent of the companies still paying.

Scott also puts more pressure on state colleges and universities to produce more graduates in science, technology, engineering and mathematics — which he said will help promote economic growth. He also wants the K-12 system to do its part in advancing STEM education.

“Florida will become the nation’s leader in job creation and economic growth by consistently doing the right things month after month to create the nation’s premier environment to start, relocated or expand a business,” Scott said.

Gov. Rick Scott is beginning his latest push for jump-starting Florida’s economy, offering a preview at a lunchtime speech Tuesday in Tallahassee and a new video his office prepared.

Scott plans to unveil much of his legislative and budget package for 2012 in the days leading up to his taking part in an Enterprise Florida trade mission to Brazil, Oct. 23-27.

In the video, the first-year governor touts tax cuts, shrinking the size of government, and fanning the flickering flames of the economy to where Florida added more than 87,000 jobs since January. No mention of the still-brutal unemployment rate: 10.7 percent in August.

 ”The proposals you will see reflect my three most important jobs as Governor— getting our residents back to work by growing quality jobs in the private sector; keeping the cost of living low for all Floridians; and building a world-class education system through continued improvements in our K-12 and higher education institutions,” Scott said. “These ideas are based on the countless stories I have received from Floridians who have contacted my office… and from the personal conversations I’ve had while traveling the state over the past year.”

See Scott’s video here:  http://bit.ly/nEL0LK

The amount of cash Florida lawmakers will have on hand to build next year’s state budget looks likely to drop from earlier predictions by between $1.4 billion and $1.7 billion, according to estimates unveiled Tuesday by state economists.

The state’s Revenue Estimating Conference, a gathering of analysts representing the Legislature, state Department of Revenue and Gov. Rick Scott’s office, are meeting most of the day to update their latest forecast of tax collections.

 The amounts settled on Tuesday will guide the budget proposal Scott will present later this year to the Legislature — and go a long way toward shaping the spending plan lawmakers put together when they begin the 2012 session in January.

The House budget committee last week said that because of declining tax receipts and rising costs — particularly in public schools and Medicaid spending – that a shortfall of $1.1 billion to $2.2 billion was expected, likely resulting in another round of program cuts and employee layoffs next year.

Tuesday’s revenue forecast looks likely to bolster those storm cloud predictions. Sales tax collections — which provides about three-quarters of the state’s general revenue — is the root of the state’s problem.

In a faltering economy,  sales tax receipts are expected to be down as much as $881.4 million next year from the estimating conference’s forecast earlier this year. Sales tax dollars also are off earlier estimates by as much as $257.5 million in the current budget.

Rising government costs and crumbling tax collections are leaving lawmakers facing a $2 billion budget shortfall next year, Senate President Mike Haridopolos said Thursday, a prospect few saw coming only months ago.

“Everything is on the table,” said Haridopolos, R-Melbourne, although he acknowled that tax increases are not. “But in June, I thought we’d be in a continuation budget. All the signs had us pointing in the right direction….But now we’re very concerned with revenue shortfalls.”

The House budget committee earlier Thursday estimated that lawmakers could come up between $1.1 billion and $2.2 billion short next year. The current year’s $69 billion budget was balanced by cutting spending, pulling cash from trust funds, and making government employees pay 3 percent of their pay to help cover pension costs.

A similar balancing act looks likely to commence in January, when lawmakers convene the 2012 session.

Florida economists are scheduled to meet Tuesday. They are expected to revise the state’s revenue forecast downward, with tax collections declining in the increasingly fragile economy.

Glimmers of trouble were evident this week, when funding for courts, road projects and school construction all reported shortfalls linked to the economy. But the news is a sharp departure from early last month, when economists forecast three years of clear budget sailing.

At that time, though, another leading senator, Don Gaetz, R-Niceville, conceded lawmakers would be wise not to celebrate over what appeared to be sufficient revenues to cover state spending through 2015.

Gaetz, in line to lead the Senate following next year’s elections, said last month that Florida’s economy is “on a knife’s edge.”

“We can’t move much, one way or the other, without some real damage,” Gaetz said.

House Budget Chair Denise Grimsley, R-Sebring, said next year was beginning to look all to familiar.

 “2012 is going to be another challenging year as we face a potential $2 billion shortfall; however, I am confident we will once again solve our budget challenges while keeping taxes low and encouraging private sector economic activity,” Grimsley said. 

Although he supports prison privatization and is committed to a broad expansion of it in Florida, Gov. Rick Scott said he disapproves of the legislature’s use of the state budget to establish policy – exactly how lawmakers ordered the privatization this spring.

“I should have the power to veto things that are major policy changes. I got elected as governor to mamke decisions on behalf of all the citizens of the state and to watch how all the money was spent. I ran a whole campaign on accountability,” Scott told reporters after Tuesday’s Cabinet meeting.

Scott appeared to be siding with a Tallahassee judge who ruled last week that the legilsature’s inclusion of the prison privatization effort in the state budget was unconstitutional.

In her ruling against Scott’s administration last week, Tallahassee Circuit Judge Jackie Fulford wrote that, if the legislature wanted to expand the prison privatization, it “must do so by general law, rather than ‘using the hidden recesses of the General Appropriations Act.’”

Scott said he hasn’t decided yet whether to appeal Fulford’s ruling, but was confident the 18-county region privatization of 29 prisons ordered by lawmakers would eventually take place.

“We’re going to do prison privatization in the state as long as we save money. I believe that we’re going to save a lot of money,” he said. During his campaign for governor, Scott said he wanted to slash prison spending by $1 billion – about half of DOC’s total budget.

Still, Scott said he’d like it if lawmakers restrict the budget to spending matters.

“That would be nice,” he said.

UPDATE: Gov. Rick Scott has appealed the appellate ruling ordering former DOC Secretary Ed Buss to give a deposition in the prison privatization lawsuit. Scott’s lawyers are asking that the full First District Court of Appeals reconsider yesterday’s three-judge panel’s ruling.
Scott spokesman Lane Wright said the governor’s office is appealing the decision about the deposition on principle because state law gives high-ranking officials immunity from testifying in lawsuits.
“It’s not about this specific case. It’s about all cases. The doctrine protecting high-ranking officials from being deposed is a bedrock principle of Florida law. It’s about the principle of the thing,” Wright said.

An appeals court ordered former Department of Corrections Secretary Ed Buss, ousted by Gov. Rick Scott last month, to testify in a lawsuit over prison privatization filed by the union that represents correctional officers.

The First District Court of Appeals in Tallahassee had temporarily halted Buss’s deposition last week, overturning a lower court ruling ordering him to be deposed by the Florida Police Benevolent Association, which filed the lawsuit.

But yesterday the appellate court agreed that Buss must give his deposition. Scott’s administration tried to block Buss’s testimony because Florida law protects high-ranking officials from having to testify in most court cases.

On Sept. 15, Tallahassee Circuit Judge Jackie Fulford ordered Buss to give his deposition, agreeing with the union in her ruling that the former secretary is “reasonably likely to have unique discoverable knowledge of potentially relevant subject matter.”

Scott forced Buss to resign late last month citing “differences in philosophy and management styles arose which made the separation in the best interests of the state.” One of the reasons for Buss’s ouster was his apparently less-than-enthusiastic support of the privatization of the 30 prisons from Manatee County to Indian River County south to the Keys.

Lawmakers ordered all of the prisons in the 18-county region south of Polk County to the Florida Keys to be taken over by a private vendor in the budget passed this spring. The PBA is objecting that including the policy change in the must-pass spending plan is unconstitutional.

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A judge ordered former Department of Corrections Secretary Ed Buss to testify in a lawsuit about the state’s privatization of prisons in the southern part of Florida.

Tallahassee Circuit Judge Jackie Fulford denied the state’s request to keep Buss, fired by Gov. Rick Scott late last month, from having to give a deposition in the lawsuit filed by the Florida Police Benevolent Association.

Buss left the agency amid the privatization of more than one-third of the state’s prisons, the largest privatization effort in the country.

His abrupt resignation came after Scott’s office twice rebuked the former Indiana prisons chief over state contracts and after the termination of a contract with Elizabeth “Betty” Gondles, one of Buss’s hand-picked aides, for a possible conflict of interest with the privatization of the department’s health services.

Attorney General Pam Bondi, representing Scott’s administration in the lawsuit, argued that, because he is no longer secretary, Buss should not have to give a deposition.

But Fulford sided with the PBA, saying that Buss is “reasonably likely to have unique discoverable knowledge of potentially relevant subject matter” and that the PBA had tried unsuccessfully to get the information elsewhere.

The PBA is challenging the privatization, alleging that it is unconstitutional because it was included in proviso language in the state budget instead of a stand-alone bill creating state policy.

A hearing is scheduled for Sept. 29.

Florida TaxWatch, the business-backed public policy group, has come up with more than $4.1 billion in potential state savings — if lawmakers and state government implement 135 cost-cutting recommendations.

Among the highlights: increasing good-behavior gain time for prison inmates, expanding electronic monitoring of criminals, and cutting back on stiff penalties for marijuana and cocaine possession. Reducing Medicaid fraud — which has bedeviled officials at the state and federal levels — could save $223.8 million alone, a TaxWatch cost-saving task force found.

TaxWatch said similar recommendations made since 2009 have saved the state more than $1 billion.

Some of the recommendations appear obvious: urging state agencies to buy generics over name-brand products could save $305 million, the organization said. And some of the ideas show some out-of-the-box thinking: selling ads on some DOT road signs could pull in $75 million, TaxWatch estimated.

Some proposals also carry plenty of controversy. Boosting eligibility requirements for students earning Bright Futures scholarships, eliminating the state’s traditional pension plan, ending the state’s Deferred Retirement Option Program for public employees are put in play, but would surely face stiff opposition from some fronts in the Legislature.

The full report is at www.FloridaTaxWatch.org

A legislative panel gave Gov. Rick Scott’s administration approval Wednesday for a $3.4 million grant drawn from the federal Affordable Care Act, the measure backed by President Obama which Florida’s Republican chief executive ridicules regularly.

The Legislative Budget Commission agreed to take the cash to provide home visiting services to at-risk families. But Sens. Joe Negron, R-Stuart, and Don Gaetz, R-Niceville, urged lawmakers to reject the funding, warning that the program’s services were murky and that if federal dollars dry up, the state could be left covering the cost.

“It’s overly intrusive,” Negron said, adding he was wary of what he called the government’s “amorphous assistance.”

Scott and the state’s Republican-led Legislature has drawn national attention for rejecting federal grants aimed at moving nursing home patients back into their homes and providing in-home counseling to families where child abuse was a looming threat. Funding for these services and others were turned down because they stem from the Affordable Care Act — which many in the GOP deride as ObamaCare.

The Legislative Budget Commission, though, went along with the Scott administration’s request to accept this latest round of grant money Wednesday. A Republican majority on the panel endorsed the move, chiefly because rejecting it would have made Florida ineligible for as much as $100 million in future learning and development grants under the federal Race to the top legislation.

House budget chair Denise Grimsley, R-Sebring, said she was offended by the linkage. But she made it clear she didn’t like the program and felt such steps created a dependency for at-risk families.

“We have generations of individuals depending on government,” Grimsley said, adding, “it’s a no-win situation.”

Despite stocks tumbling Friday after a grim U.S. job market report, a Florida legislative panel next week is expected to sign off on some relatively good economic news.

The state’s Legislative Budget Commission, comprised of House and Senate members, will be asked Wednesday to accept a new economic forecast showing lawmakers should have enough cash next year to meet the state’s “critical and high priority” needs. That basically matches current year spending, along with anticipated growth.

Lawmakers also can comfortably build in a $1 billion budget reserve, according to the Long-Range Financial Outlook analysts will put before the commission.

The three-year forecast also doesn’t call for any revenue shortfall through 2015. It’s the first time economists have given lawmakers such an all-clear horizon since voters in 2006 approved creation of  the long-term planning document.

A return of relatively steady tax collections — combined with deep budget-cutting by lawmakers last spring — is credited for the rosier outlook.

Gov. Rick Scott and the Republican controlled Legislature covered an almost $3.8 billion budget shortfall by cutting spending for schools, health and social service programs, and making government workers in the Florida Retirement System contribute 3 percent of their pay to the state pension plan. 

Still, analysts also cautioned that the steadily softening economy could dim some of the dollar projections going before lawmakers next week.

Despite a credit rating downgrade and more than 100 layoffs, Gov. Rick Scott said Tuesday he supported the dramatic changes occuring at the South Florida Water Management District, saying “absolutely the right things are happening.”

Legislation signed into law by Scott cuts property taxes across Florida’s five water management districts by $210 million. The South Florida district, the state’s largest, is slicing spending by $120 million, or about 30 percent of its property-tax collections, sparking scores of layoffs and buyouts.

The financial hit also led the ratings agency, Standard & Poor, to downgrade the district’s credit rating a notch, to AA+. Although the district has no immediate plans to issue bonds, S&P’s action could raise the future cost of borrowing by water managers.

“Why should they be out borrowing more money?” Scott said. “They should be doing what the state is doing…especially in tough times like this. What would you do in your own house? What do Floridians have to do now? They have to watch every penny.”

“That’s exactly what they should expect out of government,” Scott concluded.

Once known for its robust growth, Florida’s government is bracing for what has become a new annual tradition — the 10 percent budget cut exercise.

Budget directors for Gov. Rick Scott and legislative leaders have sent a memo to state agencies demanding that they produce budget proposals for next year that reduce spending by 10 percent. The spending plans are due Sept. 15.

Florida’s $70 billion budget this year is down from a peak of about $77 billion achieved during the last go-go pre-recession year, 2007. Since then, spending reductions have become the norm — with agencies asked to submit leaner proposals each year.

Last year, House Republicans upped the ante — asking committees to examine how agency budgets could be cut by 15 percent, an approach that sparked rebellion from House Democrats, who refused to take part.

 Cuts came anyway last spring. Lawmakers struggled to close an almost $3.8 billion budget shortfall by slashing deeply into education and health and human services, while pulling more than $1 billion in employee pension contributions from those in the Florida Retirement System.

Two Palm Beach County House Democrats are among those urging the Obama administration to deny the Republican-led Legislature’s bid to revamp Medicaid by steering 3 million low-income and elderly Floridians into managed care by 2013.

Among the reasons cited by the lawmakers in calling for federal rejection of the plan are the state’s experience across five counties, including Broward, where Medicaid patients have been placed into HMOs since 2006.

“The new legislation builds on a failed managed care platform, expands its scope introduces additional experimental elements and dramatically accelerates its implementation but without resolving the outstanding problems and concerns of the current pilot,” the lawmakers wrote the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services.

The letter was signed by Reps. Mark Pafford, D-West Palm Beach, Steve Perman, D-Boca Raton, Elaine Schwartz, D-Hollywood, and Mia Jones, D-Jacksonville. The lawmakers serve as ranking Democrats on various health and human services committees.

The Florida legislation (CS/HB 7107, 7109) was signed into law last month by Gov. Rick Scott, a Republican who earned millions of dollars as a health care executive before his election.

The new standard builds on the HMO-styled plans introduced for Medicaid patients in Broward, Baker, Clay, Nassau and Duval counties, beginning in 2006, but which have drawn poor to mixed reviews from policy analysts.

The proposed expansion, which needs federal approval, also has drawn heat in public hearings around the state.

The letter drew a quick rebuke from House Majority Leader Carlos Lopez-Cantera, R-Miami, who called the Democratic authors “reckless and irresponsible.”

“The Florida Legislature just faced one of the toughest financial legislative sessions over the past decade. That these leaders would recommend to the federal government that Florida should continue with an outrageously expensive, fraud-laden Medicaid system, almost certain to throw our state into a financial abyss, is indefensible and a political tactic that will only jeopardize Florida’s financial stability and future,” Lopez-Cantera said.

A legislative panel rejected a federal grant that could have brought Florida $35.7 million over the next five years to help patients move from nursing homes to community care, warning it could lead to state costs lawmakers don’t want to shoulder.

The Legislative Budget Commission, a 14-member panel authorized to make mid-year budget adjustments, voted 8-6 against giving state health care officials authority to accept $2 million in federal funds to plan for the program. A majority from both the House and Senate members was needed for approval, and House members dug-in against the spending.

Some leading Republican lawmakers said the program duplicated state efforts underway and could force the Legislature to pick up the tab for costs once the grant expired.

“I realize these are federal dollars, but they’re still taxpayer dollars,” said House budget chair Denise Grimsley, R-Sebring.

House and Senate Democrats on the panel voted in favor of the grant. And even a pair of prominent Republicans, Senate budget chief J.D. Alexander, R-Lake Wales, and Senate Health and Human Services budget chairman Joe Negron, R-Stuart, were on the losing side, hinting they thought accepting the grant was worthwhile.

House HHS budget chief  Rob Schenck, R-Spring Hill, said Florida was already doing a good job getting nursing home patients out of costly facilities and back home or with relatives, when appropriate. Since 2009, House officials said the state’s Agency for Health Care Administration with other agencies has moved 1,900 patients to community services — and no patients who wanted to move were denied.

“It’s unnecessary, duplicative, and when you couple that with an estimated $6 million in administrative costs for the program…I would argue that it’s always dangerous to accept federal money,” Schenck said.

Florida is one of 13 states awarded what the federal government called a demonstration grant for the program. The money comes from Congress’ federal health care overhaul, which the state is suing to have overturned. The House earlier this year blocked Senate efforts to include funding to launch the program in the state budget.

Attorney General Pam Bondi responded Thursday to West Palm Beach Democratic Rep. Mark Pafford’s request to examine the circumstances surrounding Gov. Rick Scott’s staff stiff-arming Democratic protesters at his budget-signing last month at The Villages.

Bondi hinted she was concerned, but powerless to step in.

“Throughout my nearly two decades in public service, I have been committed to transparency and open government,” Florida’s top legal officer, a Republican, wrote. “While I do not take lightly the questions you have raised, Florida law does not empower me to investigate your concerns.”

Pafford, who earlier wrote Scott seeking a response, was among Florida House Democrats who urged Bondi and Chief Financial Officer Jeff Atwater, also a Republican, to push for more answers and an apology from the governor for his office’s role in bullying a couple dozen Democratic protesters at last month’s ceremony.

A governor’s staffer apparently urged Sumter County Sheriff’s deputies to rein-in the protesters, claiming the budget-signing was a private event. Deputies confronted the protesters, keeping them out of the governor’s view and ordering them to discard their signs.

For his part, Pafford said in  a statement, “While I appreciate Attorney General Pam Bondi’s acknowledgment letter, I remain concerned that constitutional rights protecting Florida’s citizens have purposely been ignored by the Governor’s Office.

 “Since January 2011, when members of the press were banned from attending inauguration events in the state capitol building, the pattern of privacy has been the norm. I believe Floridians want answers to what transpired in The Villages and accountability,” he added.

Florida House Democrats urged a pair of Republican Cabinet members Tuesday to push for more answers and an apology from Republican Gov. Rick Scott for his office’s role in bullying a couple dozen Democratic protesters at last month’s budget-signing ceremony.

A Scott spokesman, Brian Burgess, last week acknowledged the governor’s office was wrong when a staffer apparently urged Sumter County Sheriff’s deputies to rein-in the protesters because the budget-signing was a private event.

Deputies confronted the protesters, keeping them out of the governor’s view and ordering them to discard their signs during the signing ceremony at The Villages in Central Florida.

Rep. Mark Pafford, D-West Palm Beach, last week asked Scott to explain the actions. Scott later told reporters he’d look into it, and Burgess released his statement Friday evening, blaming the action on “confusion among event staff, including an employee of the governor’s office.”

House Democrats, however, want to learn more. They want Atwater and Bondi whether civil liberties were violated and whether the governor’s office should reimburse any public funds used to hold the signing ceremony, which was live webstreamed on the Florida Republican Party website.

The Democrats concluded by asking Scott’s fellow Republicans, “What recommendations can you provide to ensure all Floridians that such a ”mistake,’ will not happen again?”

Jennifer Meale, a Bondi spokeswoman, said the attorney general was traveling to Atlanta in advance of Wednesday’s court hearing on the lawsuit by Florida and a dozen other states challenging the federal health care law.