This past legislative session, Florida governor Ron DeSantis and his fellow Republican lawmakers delivered multiple legislative handouts to the nursing home industry. That included extending protections for these companies from COVID-19-related liability lawsuits, as well as reducing the amount of resident care the facilities are required to provide to residents.

The legislation came in the wake of the nursing home industry donating hundreds of thousands of dollars to DeSantis and the Florida Republican Party in recent years.

The results of these bills could be devastating in a state where nursing homes are already chronically understaffed. In the past year alone, 29 of Florida’s 691 licensed nursing homes were flagged by the state for not abiding by the moratorium on accepting new patients when they failed to meet minimum staffing requirements for two days straight, according to reporting by Florida Politics.