Between 2022 and 2024, the Florida Legislature passed a series of tort reforms that aimed to halt lawsuit abuse. Before that time, Florida’s civil justice laws were repressive and terribly fractured, allowing lawyers to file thousands of lawsuits that were without merit. These exaggerated claims led to extremely high verdicts, resulting in skyrocketing insurance premiums for Florida citizens.
However, the legislature’s pro-business tort reforms enabled Lady Justice to bring balance to the legal scales; these reforms allowed fairness to replace the large paydays associated with excessive litigation. Florida eliminated one-way attorney fees, which allowed plaintiffs to collect huge attorney fees from defendants and their insurers if they won a lawsuit, but not the other way around. The Wall Street Journal noted: “Republicans also curbed a common practice by which attorneys inflated medical costs for injuries caused by car accidents.” In addition, the reforms outlawed attorneys’ expenses from automatically being added to disputed claims settled in court.
In 2025, anti-business interests in the legislature tried to unwind and eliminate the tort reforms. They introduced seven bills that would have rolled back earlier tort reforms —the ones designed to decrease insurance costs for Floridians and provide relief to Florida businesses.
However, none of their bills reached the floor of either chamber, except for one, which Gov. DeSantis thankfully vetoed.
Subscribe to The Florida Jolt Newsletter!
Fast-forward to late 2025. The evidence is mounting that the Florida tort reforms are beginning to pay off and, in fact, are working in a significant way for Floridians. Florida’s insurance regulator says that the top five auto insurers are reducing rates by an average of 6.5% this year. State Farm has announced a 10% reduction in automobile rates, stating that policyholders will save, on average, about $400 annually.
Since January of last year, 17 new insurers have entered the Sunshine State market, and 33 have filed for rate reduction. Progressive Insurance will be sending refunds to policyholders averaging around $300, stating that since the Florida insurance reforms of 2023, “we have seen lower loss costs on certain auto accident claims.” According to DeSantis, their auto refunds to customers totaled nearly $1 billion. Florida Peninsula Insurance has filed for a statewide rate cut of 8.4% for homeowners. Some home and auto insurers are now issuing rebates.
TaxWatch has studied these issues and reports that in the weeks leading up to the Legislature and the Governor signing the legal reforms into law, more than 280,000 civil cases were filed in Florida courts. It was projected to take about two years for those cases to move through the court system. However, TaxWatch now reports that we are seeing the positive effects of the legislative reforms, which means that Floridians can expect many more rate decreases in the future. Florida’s insurance market is now seeing greater stability.
These decreases can be contrasted with nationwide household insurance costs, which have increased by an average of 7.5% over the last 12 months. If leftists are so worried about “affordability”, which President Trump says is “a con job by the Democrats”, the political left should take note of Florida’s tort reforms, which put more money back into citizens’ pockets.
Other stories you may want to read:
Bob Rubin: Celebrating a 60-Mile Ride That Moves Us All Forward
- Here’s the Skinny on Trump’s Tariffs - January 2, 2026
- John R. Smith: Florida Tort Reforms Are Working - December 12, 2025
- John R. Smith: How America Got Swamped by $38 Trillion of Debt - November 12, 2025