Florida's First District Court of Appeals erased a grand jury's Hope Florida findings on a $10 million Centene deal, and Gov. Ron DeSantis called the probe a partisan hoax.
Gov. Ron DeSantis stood in a Miami conference room full of cameras on Thursday, waved a 19-page ruling, and spoke uninterrupted for 23 minutes. The First District Court of Appeals had published the decision late Wednesday, and the governor framed it as total vindication in the Hope Florida fight.
The court struck the grand jury's claim that his administration misappropriated $10 million from a Medicaid settlement with healthcare firm Centene as part of a "sophisticated scheme" to fund political work. Judge Lance Neff wrote the opinion. DeSantis called the leaked report a lie and a partisan exercise, and he said the kangaroo-court phase was over.
CBS News Miami detailed the press conference and the ruling as James Uthmeier stood with the governor. Uthmeier, once DeSantis's chief of staff and later his appointee as attorney general, said the appeals court reached the conclusion the administration had stated from the start.
"The First District Court of Appeals concluded what we've said from the beginning, that the state attorney process here was an abuse of power, exceeded authority, violated Florida statute."
Uthmeier added that the entire proceedings had been deemed erroneous as a matter of law.
The appeals court went straight at the core accusation. It held that the $10 million sent to the Hope Florida Foundation in the Centene settlement was never public money and never became property of the State of Florida.
"The $10 million provided to Hope Florida in the Centene settlement was never public money."
The opinion explained that the funds neither reimbursed the state for losses from Centene's overcharges nor passed through state ownership. The transfer ran directly from Centene to Hope Florida.
"The money neither reimbursed the State for losses from Centene's overcharges nor ever became the property of the State of Florida, as the transfer of the funds was directly from Centene to Hope Florida."
Centene had computed a technical overbill of $57 million and offered an additional $10 million on the condition that the state stop reviewing billing records. A draft settlement described a $67 million refund. The final structure sent $57 million to state coffers and $10 million to the Hope Florida Foundation, described as a 501(c)(3) direct-support organization and the largest donation in the foundation's history.
Hope Florida is First Lady Casey DeSantis's signature initiative. The foundation later routed money onward. Grand jury and legislative accounts tied a path of funds to political committees, including Keep Florida Clean, a PAC used to fight the 2024 marijuana-legalization amendment. Billionaire Ken Griffin had seeded that PAC with $12 million in July of that year.
The court's sharper objection was procedural. The grand jury investigated, declined to indict anyone, then published individualized findings that branded private recipients as participants in a sophisticated scheme to misappropriate funds.
"A grand jury may investigate and report, but it may not declare conduct unlawful and then decline to charge it, and it may not condemn people by name without indicting them."
Neff wrote that once the grand jury declined to indict, it retained no jurisdiction to publish criminal-like findings of culpability against named people. The panel could report the movement of funds as it related to public officials and to Hope Florida. It could not accuse unindicted private citizens of quasi-criminal wrongdoing.
DeSantis praised the opinion in blunt terms at the Miami event.
"You will never find a smackdown more thorough than what the First DCA administered to this joke of a process."
He said the ruling fully debunked any idea of misappropriation, called the charge a hoax, and said all the narratives crashed and burned with the opinion. He thanked Neff and called him a fantastic judge. Neff was the newest member of the court; DeSantis appointed him in March.
Leon County State Attorney Jack Campbell could have defended the grand jury findings on appeal. He did not participate. The appeals proceedings ran entirely in secret. Chris Kise was among the attorneys who argued against the grand jury report.
Florida officials first learned of the Centene matter in 2021 and left it alone for three years, per the account of the dispute. Settlement talks were expedited in September 2024 while DeSantis was mounting a campaign against Amendment 3 and the PAC fighting the measure was running low on funds. There was no Legislature notification and no press release on the $10 million donation.
Then-Attorney General Ashley Moody authorized former chief deputy John Guard to sign the settlement. Guard told the grand jury he had reservations about the deal and that, "esoterically," he agreed the $10 million was taxpayer money and belonged to the state. He also required a revision, so Moody would not be liable for directing the money to the foundation. Officials later treated the sum like Medicaid money and reimbursed the federal government for its share; the appeals opinion did not address that point.
Sen. Rick Scott, a Republican, took a harder line on the dollars themselves.
"Millions in tax dollars for poor kids have no business funding political ads."
Scott said the money should have gone back to the state for medical needs of poor, sick children. Some Democrats and Republicans in the Florida Legislature made similar taxpayer-money claims. A legislative committee investigated in 2025. DeSantis blamed "self-interested cabals in the state legislature" and accused the New York Times and ABC News of lying about Hope Florida.
Florida Trident reported that the governor's office used tax dollars to pay the attorneys who fought the grand jury report, with invoices at $895 an hour and fees already past $330,000.
DeSantis delivered the victory lap in South Florida while a Category 3 storm barrelled toward the other end of the state. Hurricane Isaias closed in on the Florida Panhandle with landfall expected in about 36 hours from the time of the press conference.
The governor opened with a casual greeting to the Miami room before turning to the ruling, media coverage, and what he called adult supervision from the First DCA. He said the court had restored the law and ended an abusive process.
State emergency work had already been moving for days as Isaias became the first Atlantic hurricane of 2026 and the Gulf Coast braced for impact. The political fight in Tallahassee and the storm track on the Panhandle landed in the same news cycle.
Uthmeier, now attorney general and on the ballot in November along with Moody, cast the ruling as confirmation that the state attorney process exceeded lawful authority. DeSantis said the public deserved a corrected record after the sealed grand jury report had leaked and drawn national attention the previous month.
Evacuation pressure was rising across the same window. DeSantis had urged Florida evacuations as the system neared the Gulf Coast, and local officials raced to finish preparations before landfall.
Centene's broader settlement pattern included more than twenty deals with various states, each with an additional $10 million component under similar framing. In Florida, the dispute centered on whether that extra piece was a private gift to a direct-support charity or a diversion of money that should have healed state and federal Medicaid accounts. The First DCA answered the legal question in the administration's favor and wiped the grand jury's accusatory language.
Earlier storm actions set the backdrop for the week. DeSantis declared an emergency when the system still threatened to become the season's first hurricane, and the Gulf Coast and Panhandle raced to prepare as Isaias strengthened. The governor still chose to spend Thursday midday on the Hope Florida ruling before the hit.
No one who appeared before the grand jury could say who first proposed sending the $10 million to Hope Florida. Memory lapses drew skepticism inside the jury room. The appeals court did not need a full origin story. It held that the grand jury had crossed the line by condemning people it refused to charge, and that the dollars at issue were never public funds in the first place.
DeSantis left little doubt about his reading of the result. He said there was no misappropriation, that the charge was a hoax, and that the First DCA had supplied the adult supervision the episode required. For an administration that had taken months of heat over Hope Florida, the 19-page opinion was the document it wanted in hand.
Grand juries exist to investigate crime and bring charges, not to publish quasi-criminal verdicts against people they decline to indict. Florida's appeals court enforced that limit, and the political narrative built on the leaked report collapsed with it.
