DeSantis appoints conservative judge Renatha Francis to state Supreme Court

Gov. Ron DeSantis has appointed Renatha Francis, a Palm Beach County circuit judge, to the Florida Supreme Court, effective Sept. 1. Francis had come close to becoming the first Jamaican-American appointed to the Supreme Court in 2020. She was one of six nominees to fill a vacancy on the court created by the retirement of Justice Alan Lawson.

The conservative Francis “understands what the proper role of a judge is in America’s constitutional system,” DeSantis said as he introduced her at the Richard & Pat Johnson Palm Beach County History Museum.

[ RELATED: Jamaica-born Renatha Francis a favored finalist for Florida Supreme Court ]

The appointment was announced just a day after DeSantis removed 13th Judicial Circuit State Attorney Andrew Warren for pledging not to prosecute people accused of violating Florida’s newly enacted abortion law.

DeSantis initially nominated Francis, a member of the Federalist Society, to a Supreme Court opening in 2020 but the appointment was challenged by Democratic state Rep. Geraldine Thompson on grounds she was ineligible. The state Supreme Court concurred, ruling that Francis needed to be a member of the Florida Bar for at least 10 years prior to her nomination.

Accepting the appointment, Francis said, “I stand before you, the epitome of the American dream. My beginnings are humble. I grew up in the small island of Jamaica to a mom who never finished high school, who herself was the daughter of a small farmer. What my mom lacked in financial resources, she made up for in grit, determination, faith and hard work.”

Those values, Francis said, were instilled “early and often” in her mother’s children and were reflected in Francis as a small business owner, she said.

Francis will be the second Black female on the state Supreme Court. The first was Peggy Ann Quince, who served from 1999 to 2019.

Francis has served as a judge in the 15th Judicial Circuit since 2019 and currently oversees the family and probate divisions. She was a county court judge in Miami-Dade County from 2017 to 2019. Prior to that, she served as an attorney for the First District Court of Appeals in Tallahassee from 2011 to 2017. Francis received her bachelor’s degree from the University of The West Indies in 2000 and moved to Florida four years later. She earned her law degree from Florida Coastal School of Law in 2010.

In Jamaica, she ran a bar and trucking company while attending college in Kingston and taking care of a younger sibling.

DeSantis suggested that Francis would be a fairer judge because she’s a first-generation American.

“Being an immigrant, she probably has more appreciation for our constitutional system than many people that have can trace their lineage back hundreds of years. I think sometimes people who were born here take it for granted, because they don’t have any reference to be able to compare a free society in America versus different parts of the world.

“That’s why you see some of the people that have been really, really strong in the state of Florida for upholding freedom and the rule of law have been people whose families have escaped communism in Cuba, places like Nicaragua. You see the disaster in Venezuela. Unfortunately Colombia is now going in a bad direction.”

Francis reinforced the idea in her remarks. “As a student of history growing up, I was and I remain in awe of the United States, its Constitution, its freedoms, its respect for the rule of law.”

She also pledged to “apply the law as written,” which she said, is “a timeless principle in a civil society.”

Uniformity and predictability is “essential to preserving liberty,” she said. “It restrains arbitrariness. It restrains abuses of power.”

Prior to introducing Francis, DeSantis, a Harvard Law School graduate, sketched out his judicial philosophy.

“Our government here in the United States and in the state of Florida is supposed to be what’s called a government of laws, not a government of men,” he said, calling out judges who have “taken power away from people’s elected representatives” by having “legislated from the bench.”

“And that’s not their role. Their role is to apply the law and Constitution as it’s written,” he added. “It’s really important that courts are discharging the duties that they have under the Constitution within the confines of those limitations.”

Francis, one of six nominees recommended by the Judicial Nominating Commission, is the sixth member of the seven-member state Supreme Court appointed by DeSantis since 2019. Two of his previous appointments, Barbara Lagoa and Robert Luck, were elevated by President Donald Trump to the United States Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit after serving less than a year on Florida’s Supreme Court.

When she takes the seat, Francis will be one of four sitting justices appointed by DeSantis.

The justice Francis is replacing, Alan Lawson, was appointed by Gov. Rick Scott in 2016.

The News Service of Florida contributed to this report.

Ron Hurtibise covers business and consumer issues for the South Florida Sun Sentinel. He can be reached by phone at 954-356-4071, on Twitter @ronhurtibise or by email at rhurtibise@sunsentinel.com.