Florida asks Supreme Court to freeze ruling blocking drag show law’s enforcement

In an emergency request, Florida asked the Supreme Court to allow the Republican-led state to partially enforce its law banning drag shows.

Hamburger Mary’s, a restaurant and bar in Orlando that features drag shows, sued over the legislation in May, days after Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) signed it into law.

The law is effectively on hold after a federal judge found it unconstitutional in late June, barring the state from enforcing it against anyone.

As the state’s appeal proceeds, Florida’s Republican attorney general is now asking the Supreme Court to narrow the ruling’s scope so officials can enforce the law against nonparties in the meantime.

“Hamburger Mary’s has not alleged, much less proven, that application of the Protection of Children Act to others in the State of Florida will cause actual or imminent injury to Hamburger Mary’s itself. It was a serious error for the district court nonetheless to enjoin the statute as it may apply to the rest of the world,” the state wrote in court filings. 

The request to partially enforce the drag show ban, which was docketed Tuesday, goes to Justice Clarence Thomas, a conservative who handles emergency requests arising from the federal appeals court that covers Florida. He could act on the request alone or refer it to the full court for consideration.

The legislation was one of a slew of bills widely viewed as targeting the LGBTQ community signed into law in May by DeSantis, who is running for president in 2024.

Those laws include a ban on gender-affirming medical care for transgender youths and an expanded version of a controversial state education law that limits classroom instruction on sexual orientation and gender identity.

Florida’s decision to pass a drag show ban makes it one of multiple Republican-led states to do so. Similar laws passed in places like Tennessee and Montana have also faced legal challenges.

Florida’s drag show ban makes it a misdemeanor to knowingly admit a child to an “adult live performance,” partially defined as shows that depict “lewd conduct” or “lewd exposure of prosthetic or imitation genitals or breasts” 

U.S. District Judge Gregory Presnell, an appointee of former President Clinton, found those terms ambiguous and ruled it could make the legislation “unconstitutionally vague and overbroad” in violation of the First Amendment. 

Presnell and a 2-1 panel on the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals subsequently denied Florida’s request to narrow the ruling as the case proceeds. 

The state is now bringing the request to the Supreme Court.

“Florida strongly disagrees with that conclusion and has appealed the injunction,” the state wrote to the justices. 

“But Florida did not seek to stay that injunction below as it applies to the sole plaintiff in this case, and it does not here—in part because, in Florida’s view, the conduct plaintiff is suing to protect does not actually violate the statute,” the state continued. “Instead, Florida now applies for a partial stay of the injunction to the extent it sweeps beyond the plaintiff and enjoins the statute universally.”