Governor DeSantis: VETO HB 1311!
May 25, 2026
Florida just sent a bill to Governor DeSantis’s desk that, on first glance, looks like a win for the sound money movement. HB 1311, titled “Legal Tender,” sailed through the House 108–0 and passed the Senate 32–1. Bipartisan. Unanimous, essentially. And that should be your first red flag.
When was the last time the political class unanimously handed you something that actually advanced your liberty?
The bill ratifies certain rules around gold and silver as legal tender. Sounds noble. Sounds constitutional. But here’s what the press releases won’t tell you: HB 1311 is a regulatory Trojan Horse dressed up as sound money reform.
If you run a small business in Florida and you accept gold or silver for payment—or you’d like to—this bill doesn’t liberate you. It burdens you.
The Administrative Trap
The core problem with HB 1311 is that it doesn’t simply recognize gold and silver as money and get out of the way. Instead, it constructs a framework. And in government, “framework” means paperwork. It means reporting. It means compliance costs that a mom-and-pop coin shop or a small contractor can’t absorb the way a large financial institution can.
Ask yourself: if the state of Florida truly believed gold and silver are money, why would transacting in them require more administrative friction than swiping a Visa card?
The answer is that this isn’t about sound money. It’s about regulatory capture dressed as reform. The bill creates conditions. It creates rules that must be “ratified.” It creates a system where using constitutional money puts you on a government radar. That’s not liberty—that’s surveillance with a gold veneer.
What Real Sound Money Legislation Looks Like
If Florida wanted to lead the nation on sound money, the path is embarrassingly simple. You don’t need a hundred-page bill. You need one page:
Eliminate the capital gains tax on the exchange of gold and silver.
That’s it. That’s the whole thing.
Right now, if you take a one-ounce gold coin and use it to buy groceries, the IRS treats that transaction as a taxable event. The coin didn’t change. Its value didn’t change. The dollar lost purchasing power. But you’re the one paying the tax. This is the single biggest barrier to gold and silver functioning as a medium of exchange, and it’s a barrier the state of Florida has the power to remove—without creating a single new form, a single new agency, or a single new compliance burden.
A clean bill does three things:
- Removes state capital gains tax on precious metals transactions
- Recognizes gold and silver as legal tender without qualification
- Gets the hell out of the way
No “ratifying specified rules.” No administrative conditions. No backdoor reporting requirements that turn your local coin dealer into a de facto arm of the surveillance state.
The Small Business Angle
This is where the rubber meets the road. A small business owner in Florida—say, a roofer, a mechanic, a farmer’s market vendor—should be able to accept a silver eagle the same way they accept a twenty-dollar bill. No extra paperwork. No fear of an audit. No treating the customer like a money launderer.
HB 1311 doesn’t deliver that. It delivers the opposite. It says: “Sure, you can use gold and silver- but here’s the process you need to follow.”
For a large corporation with a compliance department, that’s an inconvenience. For a small business, it’s a dealbreaker. And that’s the point. The regulatory state doesn’t ban things outright anymore. It smothers them in process.
The result? Gold and silver remain collectibles for the wealthy and curiosities for preppers, while the rest of us stay trapped in a fiat system that has lost over 96% of its purchasing power since the Federal Reserve was created.
The Federal Reserve’s Nightmare
Let’s be clear about why this matters beyond Florida’s borders. The Federal Reserve’s monopoly on money depends entirely on states not exercising their constitutional authority to make gold and silver legal tender. Article I, Section 10 of the Constitution is explicit: “No State shall… make any Thing but gold and silver Coin a Tender in Payment of Debts.”
That’s not a suggestion. It’s the supreme law of the land, and it’s been ignored for decades while the Fed inflated the money supply, enriched the banking class, and impoverished savers.
When states start recognizing gold and silver as money—real recognition, not the performative kind—the Fed’s monopoly begins to crack. Citizens get a choice. And when citizens get a choice between money that holds value and money that loses value by design, the jig is up.
That’s why bills like HB 1311 are dangerous. They give the appearance of action while reinforcing the status quo. They let politicians say “I voted for sound money” without actually threatening the central bank’s stranglehold.
Call to Action
Governor DeSantis has positioned himself as a champion of freedom and an enemy of the administrative state. This bill is a test of that commitment.
Veto HB 1311. Then work with the Sound Money Defense League and legislators who actually understand the issue to pass a clean, simple bill that removes capital gains taxes on gold and silver and recognizes them as legal tender without a thousand strings attached.
If you’re a Florida resident, call the Governor’s office. Tell them you don’t want “regulated sound money.” You want sound money. There’s a difference.
And if you’re a small business owner, start accepting gold and silver now. The best way to normalize sound money isn’t through legislation—it’s through action. Every transaction in constitutional money is a small act of secession from the fiat regime.
The bill sitting on DeSantis’s desk isn’t a victory. It’s a trap. And traps only work if you walk into them.