Florida's 2026 Government in the Sunshine Manual has not been published, open-government advocates say

For at least three decades, Florida's attorney general has published an annual guide to the state's public records and open meetings laws, a manual that clerks, records custodians, reporters and local officials keep within arm's reach. This year, there is no 2026 edition. A representative of Attorney General James Uthmeier's Tallahassee office confirmed to the Florida Phoenix that the 2025 Government in the Sunshine Manual remains the most recent version, and the office did not answer questions about why a new one has not been released.

The Phoenix, which reported the gap on Oct. 16, verified that the manual has been published every year since 1994 and found earlier editions as well. It normally appears in the spring. With Florida's general election less than three weeks away and Uthmeier on the ballot, the missing guide has become a campaign issue.

What the manual is

The Government in the Sunshine Manual is the attorney general's plain-language reference to two bodies of law: the Sunshine Law, which requires that meetings of public boards and commissions be open and noticed, and the Public Records Act in Chapter 119 of Florida Statutes. Each edition summarizes the statutes and walks through changes made by the Legislature and by the courts since the previous edition.

The manual has traditionally been produced in partnership with the First Amendment Foundation, a Tallahassee-based nonprofit that advocates for open government. The 2025 edition was the 47th. In 2022, then-Attorney General Ashley Moody released it during National Sunshine Week and made it available free of charge on the office's website.

The 2025 edition came out under John Guard, Moody's chief deputy, who served as acting attorney general after Moody was appointed to the U.S. Senate seat vacated by Marco Rubio and before Gov. Ron DeSantis appointed Uthmeier in February 2025. Guard, who now sits on Florida's Second District Court of Appeal, wrote in that edition's introduction that open government is part of the state's heritage and that its laws let citizens attend meetings and review records.

No law requires the attorney general to publish the manual. It has been produced by custom, through administrations of both parties.

Who relies on it

First Amendment Foundation Director Bobby Block told the Phoenix that records custodians, including at sheriff's offices and county departments, contact the foundation pretty much every day asking when the 2026 manual will be out, and that he has no answer for them.

The people most affected, Block said, are clerks of court and the employees who handle records requests at cities, counties, school boards and soil and water conservation districts. Without an updated manual, he said, their jobs become harder. The foundation filed a public records request about four weeks before the Phoenix story for any draft of the 2026 manual and had not received a responsive record.

Block called the situation deeply disturbing and stressed that access to public records in Florida is a constitutional right, not a privilege. He said he would encourage lawmakers to make publication a statutory requirement, saying the guide is that important.

Advocates question the timing

Block said the foundation has not received a clear explanation from the attorney general's office. He offered his own theories, while acknowledging they were speculation: the foundation has opposed DeSantis' effort to rewrite Florida's defamation law, and it supported a 2026 bill to toughen penalties for agencies that ignore records requests. He also raised the possibility that the decision has nothing to do with the foundation at all and reflects a broader desire to weaken the state's open government laws.

The records bill Block referred to was House Bill 437, sponsored by Rep. Alex Andrade, a Pensacola Republican. It would have made it a violation of the Public Records Act for an agency to fail to promptly acknowledge a request or respond in good faith, required agencies to answer requests within three business days with the records, a time estimate or a denial, required written cost estimates on request, and barred agencies that missed the deadline from charging for the records. The House passed it 111-0 on March 4, but it died in the Senate Rules Committee on March 13, according to the Florida Senate's bill history. A Senate companion by Sen. Darryl Rouson, SB 770, died in committee the same day.

When the House passed the bill, Andrade said it put pressure on DeSantis and Uthmeier to be more transparent. Andrade, who is term-limited, led a House investigation of the Hope Florida Foundation that put him at odds with the DeSantis administration; DeSantis and others have denied wrongdoing in that matter.

A crowded year for exemptions

The manual's absence follows a session in which lawmakers again considered a large number of new carve-outs from the records law. Roughly 40 bills filed for the 2026 session sought new public records exemptions, covering information about groups ranging from municipal clerks and county and city personnel to medical examiners, domestic violence victims and officers involved in use-of-force incidents, WLRN reported in January. Caroline Klancke, executive director of the Florida Ethics Institute, called that number remarkable.

Florida's open government tradition rests on the Sunshine Law, enacted in 1967, and on a 1992 constitutional amendment, Article I, Section 24, that made access to public records a constitutional right covering all three branches of state government and local governments. Only the Legislature can create new exemptions, and each must state a public necessity. The attorney general's office also runs a voluntary Open Government Mediation Program under state law to help resolve records disputes, a service that depends on both sides agreeing to take part.

A campaign issue in the attorney general's race

Uthmeier is running to keep the office he was appointed to in 2025. His Democratic opponent, José Javier Rodríguez, told the Phoenix that the manual is an essential resource for Floridians to understand their rights. Rodríguez said that if elected he would make sure the guide continues to be published and stays accessible, and said Floridians deserve an attorney general who believes in transparency.

Moody, whose office published the manual each year of her tenure as attorney general, is on the ballot this fall as well, seeking a full term in the U.S. Senate.

What's next

Unless Uthmeier's office releases a 2026 edition in the coming weeks, records custodians across Florida will continue to work from the 2025 manual, which does not reflect any court rulings or statutory changes since its publication. The First Amendment Foundation's records request for a draft remains outstanding. The attorney general's race will be decided Nov. 3, and any push to require the manual by law would have to wait for the 2027 legislative session, when Andrade will no longer be in the House to carry his records bill again.