U.S. District Judge of Miami Beth Bloom made a ruling on Tuesday to block parts of Florida law that bans cities from establishing their own “sanctuary policies” that are designed to protect undocumented migrants throughout the state.
The law in question stems from a piece of legislation from 2019 known as the Federal Immigration Enforcement Act, or SB 168, that Bloom believes is “discriminatory” and violated constitutional equal-protection rights.
The first part of the law Bloom blocked is the requirement of all state and local governmental entities, and law enforcement agencies to use “best efforts” to support the enforcement of the federal immigration policies that were established by former President Trump.
The second part of SB 168 that was blocked by Bloom, prohibited future sanctuary policies, and required the “repeal of existing sanctuary policies.”
As far as defining sanctuary policies, the law states that it is, “a law, policy, practice, procedure, or custom adopted or allowed by a state entity or local governmental entity which prohibits or impedes a law enforcement agency from complying with [federal immigration policy] or prohibits or impedes a law enforcement agency from cooperating with a federal immigration agency.”
Bloom issued a 110-page ruling to discuss her ruling, which states that the “totality of the relevant facts present significant evidence, both direct and circumstantial, of the Legislature’s discriminatory motives in enacting SB 168.”
She added, “Based on the evidence presented, the court finds that plaintiffs have proven by a preponderance of the evidence that SB 168 has discriminatory or disparate effects on racial and ethnic minorities, and these discriminatory effects were both foreseeable and known to the Legislature at the time of SB 168’s enactment.”
According to CBS Miami, Bloom questioned the development of the law, and what she called the “immigrant threat narrative” by the legislature that she claims lead to it. As stated in the report, “She also cited behind-the-scenes involvement of the group Floridians for Immigration Enforcement in pushing for the law, including contacts with the office of Senate sponsor Joe Gruters.”
To further her argument in the ruling, Bloom included a reference to a 2018 campaign ad by Governor DeSantis, as well as the statements he made regarding immigration at during his 2019 inauguration speech.
“Running for his current position, Governor DeSantis also perpetuated the immigrant threat narrative through his campaign advertisements, which depicted him building a wall with his son, and his public statements associating ‘illegal immigrants’ with ‘lawlessness’ and voicing his support for eliminating sanctuary jurisdictions,” Bloom wrote.
An Action News Jax report states that Governor DeSantis’ Office released a statement saying that they will appeal Bloom’s ruling and “expect to win.”
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Casey Owens is a contributing writer for The Florida Capital Star. Follow him on Twitter at @cowensreports. Email tips to [email protected].
