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Could Gov. DeSantis remove Monique Worrell from state attorney's office a second time?

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Updated  November 6, 2024 9:15pm EST
2024 Election
FOX 35 Orlando

Could Gov. DeSantis remove Monique Worrell again?

Monique Worrell is removing the word "former" from her title of "State Attorney." Worrell won two-thirds of the vote in 2020, but Gov. Ron DeSantis removed her from the position, accusing her of incompetence and neglect of duty. Could it happen again?

ORLANDO, Fla. - Monique Worrell is removing the word "former" from her title of "State Attorney."

Worrell won two-thirds of the vote in 2020, but Gov. Ron DeSantis removed her from the position, accusing her of incompetence and neglect of duty. DeSantis then replaced her with Andrew Bain.

On Tuesday night, voters in Orange and Osceola counties spoke up, and 57% of them chose to reinstate her to office.

"I want to thank the voters for standing with me and saying, ‘We don't believe you, Ron DeSantis. We don't believe you. We believe in the woman that we elected,’" Worrell told a crowd of supporters on election night. 

Some people think she could face more problems with DeSantis moving forward. FOX 35 News reached out to DeSantis for reaction to Worrell's victory but didn’t hear back. 

We did hear back from Thomas Feiter, who ran for State Attorney in the Republican primary election but lost out to Seth Hyman, who dropped out of the general election days later. Hyman has been accused of being a "ghost candidate" handpicked by the governor. 

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"Without any change in circumstances, he dropped out of the race as soon as he won the Republican primary, and then he endorsed Andrew Bain. And then, of course, we see millions of dollars poured into Andrew Bain’s campaign by the Republican Party," Feiter explained. 

Feiter repeatedly sent letters to the Florida Bar and even filed a lawsuit accusing DeSantis, the Chair of the Orange County Republican Executive Committee, and other Republican officials of election interference in the State Attorney’s Race.

In one letter to the bar, he said he believes the governor intends to remove Worrell a second time. 

"I think he very well may try, but I think the possible repercussions for him doing so would be too great," Feiter told FOX 35. "But, I’m not Ron DeSantis. Let’s see what he does." 

Feiter said he plans to run again in 2028. But for now, he says Worrell has been democratically elected and everyone needs to accept that. 

"Justice prevails," Worrell said. "Justice prevails in the light of dishonesty."

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