TALHASSEE – Gov. Ron DeSantis and a Republican legislative leader signed a contract over illegal immigration Monday night, requiring the governor to share enforcement power with members of Florida’s cabinet.
In a compromise, GOP lawmakers have concluded a two-week feud on the bill passed last month, stripping him of most of his immigration enforcement rights.
Instead, lawmakers will meet at another special legislative meeting on Tuesday to pass various bills that will create a new state immigration executive committee consisting of governors, attorney generals, chief financial officers and agricultural commissioners. It must be.
The new law also eliminates Desantis’ control over the transport of immigrants, according to a memo to lawmakers released by House Speaker Daniel Perez and Senator R-Wauchula President Ben Albritton. DeSantis used its power to fly immigrants from Texas to Martha’s vineyards in 2022.
DeSantis called Perez and Albritton “great partners” in a statement Monday night.
“We’ve created an aggressive bill that allows us to stand completely behind,” Desantis said.
Perez and Albritton said in the memo they will make “slight changes” to the three new bills that passed two weeks ago.
Instead of making Agriculture Commissioner Wilton Simpson the state’s top immigration enforcer, it would eliminate that position. Instead, the new state commission will oversee a $250 million grant to local police to learn how to support federal immigration officers.
It will also create new state-level crimes for immigrants who illegally infiltrate the nation and re-enter the country, according to legislative leaders.
And those in the country illegally will automatically be denied bail if they are arrested, Desantis’ priority.
The agreement resolved an extraordinary conflict between DeSantis and Republican-controlled Congress about how best to implement President Donald Trump’s immigration agenda.
Perez and Albritton rebuked him to call lawmakers and to carry out his own immigration ideas for a special legislative meeting when DeSantis called out to lawmakers and returned to Tallahassee to carry out his own immigration ideas for a special legislative meeting. They passed their own laws, which they said were strong, which gave Simpson the power to immigration enforcement, with whom DeSantis had a chilly relationship.
Desantis launched a fierce campaign online, and on national television, he defeated Republican lawmakers who voted for legislation.
Under the new agreement, Simpson will be given around $46 million to hire an additional 84 officers “to strengthen its blocking efforts,” according to the joint statement. This includes building a new “stolen station” along Interstate 10 in the Florida Panhandle.
Under the contract, Desantis drops his idea of spending $350 million to fly immigrants to other countries. Lawmakers have previously questioned how DeSantis is implementing a program to fly immigrants to other states.
Under the new bill, the state program will be replaced by a new bill that “transporting illegal aliens will be done only in the federal direction and fully refunds for state taxpayers.”
Lawmakers scheduled to be in Tallahassee for a committee meeting will be convened at noon to take up the proposed bill.
Alexandra Glorioso, a reporter from the Times/Herald Tallahassee Bureau, contributed to this report.
