Today U.S. District Judge Ursula Ungaro ruled that Governor Rick Scott’s Executive Order 11-58 providing for pre-employment drug testing and random drug testing of state employees violates the Fourth Amendment ban on unreasonable searches and seizures. See American Federation of State County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME) Council 79 v. Rick Scott, Case No. 11-civ-21976-UU. “To be reasonable under the Fourth Amendment, a search ordinarily must be based on individualized suspicion of wrongdoing,” Judge Ungaro wrote in her order, citing previous U.S. Supreme Court orders that ruled that urine tests are considered government searches.
This ruling also raises doubts about a new state law signed by Governor Scott this spring and which goes into effect on July 1, 2012 that would allow the Governor’s agency heads to randomly drug tests employees every three months provided that the random sample is not more than ten percent of the agency’s workforce.
Although Governor Scott suspended Executive Order 11-58 in June because of the lawsuit, he stated that he will appeal today’s ruling.
Author(s): Brett J. Schneider & Raquel Elejabarrieta
