After an investigation from the Miami Herald, published last month, found Florida Attorney General and UF law adjunct professor James Uthmeier is paid $100,000 a year at UF’s Levin College of Law — for teaching a single, two-hour class a week — some members of the law school community have criticized the high figure. Others, including one of his own students, justify the sum by pointing out the unique perspective he brings to the classroom.
Combined with his attorney general salary, Uthmeier makes $240,000 a year from taxpayer funds, almost $100,000 more than Gov. Ron DeSantis.
He is the highest-paid adjunct professor at the law school by $20,000, according to salary records provided by UF. The second-highest paid adjunct professor, Jonathan Grossman, made $80,000 a year. Grossman teaches bar preparation classes at several Florida law schools, according to his website.
Uthmeier teaches a two-credit upper-level course on federalism and the separation of powers on Mondays from 5 to 7 p.m., for which he makes an over two-hour drive from his home in Tallahassee. He currently teaches no other classes but acts as a part-time adviser to students within the law school.
Uthmeier’s office did not respond to several requests for comment over email and phone. When approached by two Alligator reporters at his classroom, Uthmeier declined to comment, walking quickly away in the other direction.
Jake Heiges, a 26-year-old UF law student who is currently taking Uthmeier’s two-credit class, said the anger over his salary should not be directed at Uthmeier. If the school offered him the money, he had every right to take it, he said.
“If somebody’s throwing a bag, I think you should take the bag,” he said. “If someone came up to me and said, ‘Here’s 100 grand to do X amount of work.’ You kidding me? I’m saying yes.”
He compared Uthmeier to basketball player Luol Deng, saying Deng got paid much more than he was worth and to “take that for what you will.”
Deng signed a four-year, $72 million contract with the Los Angeles Lakers in 2016, which is often described as one of the worst contracts in NBA history. Because of the nature of the contract, the Lakers ended up paying Deng several million dollars a year after he no longer played for the team.
Heiges said he was looking for a two-credit class for the Spring and was influenced to take Uthmeier’s class because of his experience as attorney general, saying it made him intrigued, and it’s “a good connection to have.”
“His practical experience is unlike what you find from most law professors,” he said. “I do think that it brings a sort of invaluable perspective that you don’t get from pure academics.”
Peter Molk, the dean of faculty affairs and professor at UF Law, said schools hire adjunct professors for different reasons, including the courses they can teach, the experiences they have and the connections they bring to the school from their professions.
“He brings the courses that he covers, like any adjunct, and then he also brings in the access for students to see what the state’s highest legal official, how they work, the different connections that person might have and hopefully the job that that person will help students find,” he said.
Molk said he would need to get a better sense of the market demand for someone in Uthmeier’s position to determine if $100,000 is too high. But he’d expect Uthmeier to be among the more highly valued adjunct professors, he said.
Valeria Alatorre, a 21-year-old UF political science and criminology junior, said she’s disappointed by Uthmeier’s employment overall, and the size of his salary only increased her disapproval.
“I definitely think the funds can be allocated to something else,” she said. “I just don’t think that the tuition that these law students pay for, I don’t think this is what it should be going to.”
As a pre-law student, she said a law school’s purpose is to help students pass the bar exam, and Uthmeier’s position does not serve that mission more than other professors.
“I don’t think an attorney general is really improving their education,” she said.
UF spokesperson Cynthia Roldán declined to comment on Uthmeier’s salary, in an email to The Alligator Feb. 24.
Contact Alexa Ryan at aryan@alligator.org. Follow her on X @AlexaRyan_.
Alexa is a second-year journalism and international studies student and The Alligator's Spring 2026 Enterprise Politics Reporter. She previously served as the Fall 2025 Criminal Justice Reporter. In her free time, she enjoys running, traveling and going on random side quests.
