Florida lawmakers give the go-ahead for DeSantis' special session on immigration

Florida’s legislative leaders have officially made the call: the House and Senate are scheduled to meet in special session at 10:30 a.m. Monday. However, it remains unclear whether Gov. Ron DeSantis will get all of the immigration and ballot reform changes he’s calling for at this time.

The DeSantis administration has unveiled several proposals it wants lawmakers to approve in a special session. The ideas have two main themes: immigration and citizen ballot initiatives.

DeSantis wants Florida to get a jump on enforcing President Donald Trump’s immigration crackdown.

“Clearly, this immigrations stuff, there’s a mandate from the voters. They want this dealt with," DeSantis said this week during a conversation on immigration in Jacksonville.

"They are sick of having lawlessness reign supreme in this county when it comes to who is in this country. That is not for foreigners to decide; it’s for us to decide as Americans through the normal political process and the laws we choose to enact through our elected representatives.”

Among the ideas DeSantis has floated: ending in-state tuition subsidies for people in the country illegally and giving local law enforcement more powers to enforce and execute immigration laws.
DeSantis also wants further restrictions on how citizen-led constitutional proposals can be validated.

The proposals come after one amendment that would have legalized recreational marijuana use and another that would have lifted the state’s six-week abortion limits failed during the November election. The governor opposed both.

Under his proposals, campaigns would no longer be able to use petition gatherers. Signatures would have to be collected at local supervisor of elections offices or by requesting a petition through the mail, and the state would have greater authority to reject ballot initiatives.

The heavy focus on illegal immigration, though, has riled advocates like Tallahassee-based attorney Elizabeth Ricci. (Ricci's law office is a frequent supporter of WFSU.)

“I don’t think anyone who is reasonable is saying we don’t need immigration reform. This is not the way to do it. It’s not for states to do. They don’t have the authority. Let the federal government do what it should be doing. In the meantime, states like Florida should be attending to the everyday needs of Floridians with things they have the authority to control and improve," she said.

Democratic Senate leader Jason Pizzo is also critical of the plan to strip in-state tuition from students in the country illiegally. It would include those brought to the U.S. as children and later granted Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, or DACA, during the Obama administration.

In 2014, Florida passed a law that allows these students, including DACA recipients, to avoid the high out-of-state costs. DACA recipients are not considered illegal and can work under federal protections.

"The governor keeps hammering on that. … Has anyone reminded him it was his lieutenant governor who carried that bill? That his (agriculture) commissioner (Wilton Simpson) voted for it, the CEO (Jimmy Patronis) voted for it. …I don’t know," Pizzo told reporters Friday after given remarks to the Capital Tiger Bay Club.

The bill was sponsored by Lt. Gov. Jeanette Nunez when she was a state representative.

Pizzo did say he’s OK with complying with federal immigration laws, but that the state handling deportations doesn’t make sense.

While most of the measures appear to be ideologically aligned with the state’s Republican majority, the leaders of the state House and Senate initially said they wouldn’t go along with a special session and called it “premature.”

In Jacksonville, DeSantis pushed back on that.

“Monday’s special session is a great opportunity for members of the Florida Legislature to put their money where their mouth is," DeSantis said. "Everyone has been complaining about (President Joe) Biden for four years. Now we have a new sheriff in town. Now we have an opportunity to make a difference.”  

On Friday afternoon, the DeSantis administration seemingly drove home the point. The Florida Department of Law Enforcement announced it had arrested a noncitizen for voter fraud.

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