BREAKING: Appeals Court upholds Florida ban on children attending sexualized drag shows

An appeals court on Tuesday sided with Florida, affirming the state’s ban on children attending drag shows that depict adult content. Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier called the ruling a "huge victory for our team."

Florida’s Protection of Children Act makes it a misdemeanor to “knowingly admit a child to an adult live performance” that depicts “nudity, sexual conduct, sexual excitement, or specific sexual activities, lewd conduct, or the lewd exposure of prosthetic or imitation genitals or breasts.” The state had been sued by a restaurant called Hamburger Mary’s arguing that “lewd” is overbroad, and that a portion of the act relating to “the age of the child present” is overbroad and vague. 

After additional briefing and with the benefit of oral argument, we are convinced the district court erred in preliminarily enjoining the enforcement of the Act. This is so for two reasons. First, the district court lacked authority to impose a universal injunction that prevented the enforcement of the Act against everyone in Florida,” the ruling from the Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit stated, citing the Supreme Court’s holding that universal injunctions are unconstitutional. 

“Second, Hamburger Mary’s was not entitled to even a more limited preliminary injunction to prevent the enforcement of the Act because its claims do not have a substantial likelihood of success on the merits,” the ruling added. “The Supreme Court of Florida’s definition of ‘lewd’ eliminates any overbreadth, and the use of the phrase ‘age of the child present’ does not render the Act unconstitutionally vague. Accordingly, we vacate the district court’s preliminary injunction in its entirety.”

In vacating the preliminary injunction placed on the law, the court wrote, “Because Hamburger Mary’s has failed to establish a substantial likelihood of success on the merits, we cannot sustain the district court’s preliminary injunction even if we were to narrow it to apply solely to Hamburger Mary’s and its associates.”