Tallahassee – Governor Ron DeSantis and state legislators have measured how President Donald Trump’s immigration orders, so they illegally receive state college tuition fees from mandatory death penalties for immigrants in the country. From banning it all, I thought up everything.
However, there is one topic that has fallen out of the table.
The bill passed by Congress and signed by DeSantis on Thursday, state lawmakers will be screening workers through e-verify, a federal database that checks the status of employees’ citizenship. It’s not demanding from the company. They have not allocated any more resources to implement it, and have not increased penalties for businesses that are violating it.
Democrats seized the omission this week, saying they were refuting claims that DeSantis and Republican leaders were passing the “stiffest” immigration laws in the country.
“If you’re not aware of, identifying, or not about employment, you’re not a serious person, a politician or a civil servant,” said D-Miami Sen. Jason Pizzo on Wednesday.
“This is weak. It’s really, really, really weak,” he added.
For a long time, Florida lawmakers have resisted the e-verify requirement on companies that overwhelmingly fund political campaigns.
That changed in 2020 when DeSantis urged lawmakers to demand that all public employers, contractors and subcontractors screen new employees through e-Verifie. In 2023, lawmakers expanded the requirements to private employers with more than 25 employees.
But it captures less than 20% of Florida businesses and can be avoided by employers and employees.
It is also far from the strictest in the country.
Arizona, Mississippi and Alabama require all employers to screen workers. For the first time since 2013, Georgia has requested that all employers with more than 10 workers be screened for them. (The Georgia employer has half of Florida’s population and was the largest user of e-verify in 2023, according to the federal program.)
None of the 32 bills proposed by lawmakers or DeSantis last month proposed expanding it to more businesses.
On Thursday, Pizzo submitted an amendment requiring all businesses to screen employees through electronic verification, but Republican senators ruled it “good” to avoid voting for it. I did.
“The three special sessions without discussion on e-verify are in no particular order,” Sen. Jennifer Bradley of R-fleming Island later posted to X.
Desantis said Thursday that it helped expand the requirements for all new employees at its legislative meeting scheduled to begin on March 4th.
“When I originally proposed e-verify, I wanted it for all my employees,” he said.
Republican lawmakers said they’ll consider that this week.
In the meantime, some people have accused Desantis of not already using the law in their books.
“We have passed a bill on e-verify. Sen. Randy Fine of R-Melbourne Beach said:
Until two weeks ago, Desantis’ management had not taken any action against its employer for violating the e-Verify requirements. The state also took no action against state contractors after a Pinellas County Sheriff’s Deputy was illegally killed by a man from the country who worked for the company. (Workers and colleagues cleared the electronic verification through out-of-state IDs.)
After Republican lawmakers began asking questions about the lack of enforcement last month, the Desantis administration issued warning letters to 40 companies.
The letter accused Congress of not funding lawmakers of challenged e-verify enforcement.
The law signed Thursday (part of the deal between DeSantis and the state legislative leader) does not include any additional resources for enforcement. (The bill will strengthen penalties for the nation’s people for illegally committing crimes.)
Furthermore, the law will not intensify penalties for businesses that violate e-verify’s provisions. Companies can avoid screening by employing workers as subcontractors after the workers obtain their taxpayer ID numbers and establishing a company or limited liability company.
Lawrence McClure of R-Dover said lawmakers don’t know what to do with e-Verify now to see how data from Desantis’ Commerce Department is effective in the first place.
“If you haven’t done that, you can expand it until your face turns blue,” McClure said. “Start the evaluation process, retrieve the data and then adjust it.”
