TAMPA, Fla. (WFLA) — Military service members can get free admission to The Florida Aquarium over Memorial Day weekend.

Active-duty military, veterans, retired military personnel, drilling reservists, National Guardsmen, and honorably or medically discharged service members will receive free general admission from Saturday, May 23, to Monday, May 25.

Military service members will need to show a valid U.S. Military ID or DD Form 214 to get a free ticket at the ticket window.

“In honor of the courage, commitment, and sacrifice of our nation’s military service members, The Florida Aquarium will once again offer complimentary general admission during Memorial Day weekend as a heartfelt thank-you to those who serve and have served our country,” the aquarium said.

The aquarium said it will offer extended hours from 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. throughout the three-day weekend.

To learn more about the aquarium, visit its website.

Florida officials will pay nearly half a million dollars to a biologist who was fired by a state agency for criticizing conservative activist Charlie Kirk on social media after his death.

The state’s Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission fired biologist Brittney Brown in September after she reposted a meme on her personal Instagram account that claimed Kirk wouldn’t care about children being shot in their classrooms. She filed a lawsuit seeking reinstatement, saying she struggled to find other work because the state agency is the regulatory body for her research specialization in bird conservation.

Brown on Thursday signed a $485,000 settlement agreement with agency directors that covers back pay, damages and attorney costs. She agreed as part of the deal to not seek future employment at the agency.

Fish and Wildlife officials did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Other workers also filed pending lawsuits over being fired over comments about Kirk’s assassination 

Brown was among a wave of workers in both the public and private sector who lost their jobs over comments about Kirk’s assassination on a Utah university campus. Lawsuits are pending over many of those firings.

Before his death, Kirk and the organization he founded, Turning Point USA, galvanized the conservative youth vote to help President Donald Trump win a second term.

Kirk’s supporters combed social media after the Sept. 10 shooting for posts they viewed as celebrating his death. Influencers like Laura Loomer pledged to ruin the careers of people who made light of the killing, and the conservative social media account Libs of TikTok shared the identities and workplaces of many who posted with its audience of millions.

Libs of TikTok posted about Brown, and she was fired the next day, according to her lawsuit. Brown said someone then alerted Libs of TikTok about her termination only about 10 minutes after it happened and before it was made public.

In a rare instance in Tennessee, a retired police officer was jailed for 37 days over a Facebook post joking about Kirk’s assassination. Tennessee officials agreed Wednesday to pay $835,000 to settle a lawsuit filed by the man, Larry Bushart. While behind bars, Bushart lost his postretirement job and missed the birth of his granddaughter before authorities eventually dropped a felony charge against him, he said in the lawsuit.

Before her termination, Brown worked for Florida’s Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission for about seven years and studied shorebirds and seabirds on the panhandle, according to court documents.

Carrie McNamara, an attorney with the ACLU of Florida, called Brown’s settlement deal “a hard-won vindication” that sends a message to Florida officials that they cannot punish speech they dislike.

“The First Amendment does not disappear when someone accepts a government job,” McNamara said.

Brown’s former supervisor at the agency, Habitat and Species Conservation Director Melissa Tucker, had claimed that Brown’s post generated hundreds of formal complaints and caused significant disruption. Discovery in the case later revealed that the agency only received about 50 complaints.

U.S. District Judge Mark Walker imposed sanctions against Tucker last week for exaggerating the amount and then not correcting the record.

A Florida man convicted of fatally stabbing of his cousin’s girlfriend and the couple’s 4-year-old daughter is set to be executed Thursday evening.

Richard Knight, 47, is scheduled to receive a three-drug injection starting at 6 p.m. at Florida State Prison near Starke. Knight was sentenced to death after being convicted of two counts of first-degree murder in 2006 for the deaths of Odessia Stephens and her four-year-old child, Hanessia Mullings.

This would be Florida’s seventh execution so far this year, following a record 19 executions in 2025. Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis oversaw more executions in a single year in 2025 than any other Florida governor since the death penalty was reinstated in 1976. The previous record was set in 2014 with eight executions.

According to court records, Knight had been living in Coral Springs, near Fort Lauderdale, with his cousin, his cousin’s girlfriend and their daughter in June 2000. Knight and Stephens frequently argued about Knight living there. One evening while Knight’s cousin was at work, Stephens told Knight that he would need to move out the next morning. Knight became angry and stabbed Stephens multiple times and then attacked the young girl, officials said.

While being held at the Broward County Jail following his arrest, Knight confessed the killings to another inmate, who testified against Knight during his trial.

The Florida Supreme Court denied Knight’s appeals last Friday. The court rejected his claim of newly discovered evidence, pointing out that an unidentified fingerprint found on a knife at the murder scene was known about and addressed during Knight’s original trial. The court also rejected claims based on Florida’s execution protocols and warrant process.

A final appeal was still pending before the U.S. Supreme Court.

A total of 47 people were executed in the U.S. in 2025. Florida led the way with a flurry of death warrants signed by DeSantis. Alabama, South Carolina and Texas tied for second with five executions each.

An execution was scheduled for Thursday in Tennessee. And another execution is planned in Florida on June 2. Andrew Richard Lukehart, 53, was convicted of fatally beating of his girlfriend’s infant daughter in 1996.

All Florida executions are carried out via lethal injection of a sedative, a paralytic and a drug that stops the heart, according to the Department of Corrections.