DeSantis, Trump administration partner on cracking down on illegal immigration in Florida
The administrations of President Donald Trump and Gov. Ron DeSantis on Wednesday touted their collaboration to crack down on illegal immigration, days after all of Florida’s sheriffs announced they had entered immigration law enforcement partnerships with the federal government.
“Upon President Trump taking office, I immediately said our agencies are going to work with the federal government to conduct interior enforcement operations,” DeSantis said during a media conference at the Homestead Air Reserve Base.
On Monday, the Florida Sheriffs’ Association said that all of Florida’s 67 county jails had signed what are known as 287(g) agreements with Immigration and Customs Enforcement, the Department of Homeland Security agency tasked with detaining and repatriating immigrants with deportation orders. The 287(g) program is a partnership with ICE that grants state and local law enforcement limited immigration enforcement powers.
DeSantis said Florida is the only state in the country where all counties have done this. The Florida Highway Patrol and the Florida Department of Law Enforcement recently conducted 58 traffic stops in Gadsden County that led to the identification of six undocumented immigrants, according to the governor.
“We are setting the table for other states to follow,” said Brevard County Sheriff Wayne Ivey at the media conference.
Miami-Dade Sheriff Rosie Cordero-Stutz was also among those in attendance, as were sheriff and law enforcement officers from other Florida counties. Behind DeSantis and others who spoke were law enforcement planes, helicopters and boats.
In her swearing-in ceremony a month ago, Cordero-Stutz reiterated that while she had Trump’s backing in her race, she deemed immigration enforcement a federal duty. She declined to talk to the media Wednesday to clarify how Miami-Dade will enforce this agreement.
Immigration advocates have previously slammed the 287(g) program because they say it can make immigrant victims of crime afraid to come forward. The Florida Legislature recently passed a law that creates a state-level crime for immigrants who come to Florida and are in the country illegally. It also enhances criminal penalties based on immigration status, repeals in-state tuition waivers for undocumented students, and makes the death penalty mandatory for undocumented immigrants who commit capital felonies. DeSantis signed the bill into law earlier this month.
READ MORE: Lawmakers just made Florida a harsher place for immigrants here illegally. This is how.
Keith Pearson, senior counselor at the Department of Homeland Security, said at the media event that Florida counties had signed up for two 287(g) program models. One allows police to serve federal immigration warrants to people in their custody, while the other grants local and state officers limited immigration authority during routine police duties.
Pearson said the key to the success of 287(g) agreements is that feds and state agencies “avidly collaborate with ICE to apprehend aliens with serious criminal records who, under President Biden, were released from state and local detention instead of safely being transferred to other jails.”
The Department of Homeland Security reported on Wednesday that it had carried out over 20,000 arrests of undocumented immigrants in one month, compared to 33,000 during the entire last year of the Biden administration.
“Hundreds of thousands of criminals were let into this country illegally,” Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem in a statement. ”We are sending them home, and they will never be allowed to return.”
This story was originally published February 26, 2025 at 7:35 PM.