Florida Supreme Court ends three-decade reliance on ABA, handing win to DeSantis

by Liv Caputo, Florida Phoenix
January 15, 2026

In a massive win for Gov. Ron DeSantis, the Florida Supreme Court Thursday ended its reliance on the agency in charge of accrediting law schools.

This ends Florida’s more than three-decade dependence on the American Bar Association, the state’s sole accrediting body. Because the ABA does not serve Floridians’ “best interest,” five of six justice agreed, Florida will reach out to alternative accreditors, effective Oct. 1.

This comes just one day after DeSantis bashed the ABA as a left-wing organization undeserving of being the “arbiter of legal education,” and months after Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier accused the organization of discriminating against Roman Catholics.

“The Court is persuaded that it is not in Floridians’ best interest for the ABA to be the sole gatekeeper deciding which law schools’ graduates are eligible to sit for the state’s General Bar Examination and become licensed attorneys in Florida,” the Court wrote in their nine-page opinion.

Although graduates of ABA-accredited law schools will continue to qualify to sit for the state’s General Bar Examination, so would graduates of law schools accredited by any “subsequently recognized programmatic accreditor,” the opinion continues.

‘Woke’ and ‘partisan’

Higher education in Florida has become a political battleground under DeSantis, who’s vowed to root out and abolish any and all “woke” policies within the state’s institutions. He’s led the nation in overhauling university structures, flipping the progressive New College into a “Hillsdale of the South” while installing GOP leaders as the head of multiple state colleges and universities.

DeSantis’ efforts inspired a nationwide conservative movement. Earlier this week, Texas became the first state in the nation to end its reliance on the ABA, the national agency that serves as the primary accreditor for multiple states.

In a press conference Wednesday, DeSantis slammed the ABA while his staff took to social media and hinted that reporters should “stay tuned” on potentially throwing out the accrediting organization, which has been Florida’s only accrediting body since 1992.

“The ABA is a very, very partisan activist organization, and you have a right to be that, but you should not then be the arbiter of legal education,” DeSantis said.

This echoed comments made by Uthmeier in November, demanding the ABA not “horsewhip” St. Thomas University College of Law, a Catholic institution in Miami that the ABA in August declared out-of-compliance with the association’s anti-discrimination and equal-opportunity standards.

In March, the Florida Supreme Court created a workgroup to propose alternatives to the ABA in the Bar admissions process, partially because “reasonable questions” had arisen about the ABA’s accreditation standards on “racial and ethnic diversity in law schools and about the ABA’s active political engagement.”

This came amid DeSantis’ moves to create a new accreditation system for state universities.

Not all justices agreed on tossing the ABA. Justice Jorge Labarga, the sole non-DeSantis appointee left on the court, dissented.

“I cannot agree with this action,” he wrote. “Regrettably, under the guise of expanding the accrediting agencies for law schools in Florida, the majority has taken the extraordinary step of divesting the ABA of its three decades long status as the sole accreditor of Florida law schools.”

Of note, DeSantis on Wednesday appointed Adam Tanenbaum to the Supreme Court to fill a vacancy left by Charles Canady. This means six out of the seven justices are now DeSantis appointees. Labarga, the lone standout, must retire in October 2027 when he reaches the age limit of 75.

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