TALLAHASSEE, Fla. — Immigrant rights activists rallied on the steps of the Florida Capitol Tuesday, calling on state lawmakers to reject the hard-line immigration policies of President Trump and his close ally, Gov.-elect Ron DeSantis.
- DeSantis pledged "sanctuary city" crackdown during campaign
- Sanctuary city crackdown legislation has not fared well in state Senate
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As the president presses for construction of a massive wall along the Mexican border and his administration steps up detentions of Central American immigrants, DeSantis is pledging to crack down on so-called "sanctuary cities" that don't assist federal authorities in arresting and detaining undocumented immigrants.
The governor-elect has also expressed support for Trump's campaign to end birthright citizenship. By amending the Constitution to remove the promise of citizenship for the American-born children of illegal immigrants, the president predicts illegal immigration would plummet.
Ariel Sabillon, a Honduran immigrant with undocumented family members, said he's "terrified" of DeSantis' campaign trail prescriptions being put into action.
"I feel bad for his supporters, not because I think they are dumb; just because I see that they are being led on by someone who pretends to care for them but actually really doesn't," Sabillon said. "He's using immigrants as a scapegoat, which is what Hitler did with the Jews - this is not anything new."
But immigration enforcement advocates take a different view of the governor-elect's proposals. Many voted for him specifically because of his full-throated support for the "rule of law," which he says sanctuary cities aren't following.
"What we can do is if somebody's here illegally and they commit a criminal offense against somebody, once they're convicted and serve, they need to be turned over to the appropriate authorities and then repatriated," DeSantis told supporters during the campaign.
Penalizing the municipalities, however, would likely require legislative authorization. For two years running, Florida House Republicans have filed sanctuary city crackdown bills, only to see them die in the more moderate state Senate.
The question now weighing on undocumented immigrants and their families is whether DeSantis' victory on the back of a tough-on-immigration platform will change the legislative calculation.
"I'm very scared of the way that people are treating immigrants and the way that the rhetoric against immigrants is ramping up with every single week, it seems," Sabillon said.