A coalition of civil rights and immigrants’ rights leaders issued a travel alert today informing individuals traveling to Florida to anticipate the possible violation of their constitutional rights if Senate Bill 168 and House Bill 527 become Florida law.
The ACLU said in a tweet: “BREAKING: We and partners have issued a travel advisory urging immigrants and people of color to use extreme caution when traveling in Florida. The state is on the verge of passing a draconian anti-immigrant bill which will endanger our communities.”
BREAKING: We and partners have issued a travel advisory urging immigrants and people of color to use extreme caution when traveling in Florida.
The state is on the verge of passing a draconian anti-immigrant bill which will endanger our communities.
— ACLU (@ACLU) April 8, 2019
This statement is a response to Florida Senate Bill 168 and House Bill 527, which prohibit sanctuary policies and require state, local, governmental and law enforcement agencies to help support federal immigration laws. The Senate bill was introduced by Republican Florida state Sens. Joe Gruters, Aaron Bean, and Debbie Mayfield and would be scheduled to take effect July 1.
This Florida bill is an effort to ensure local governments in Florida fully comply with requests from federal immigration authorities.
The proposal moved forward after unsuccessful attempts by Democrats to add protections for undocumented immigrants who are victims or witnesses of crimes. Another push by Democrats to carve out education records from being shared with federal immigration authorities also failed.
So Florida is actually going to help our immigration federal management people control illegal immigration? And that’s a bad thing?
