Florida’s sanctuary cities ban has been a success. With the Supreme Court’s taking up of the Trump administration’s Census case, weighing whether illegal immigrants should be counted, it reminded me it’d been just over a year since Florida’s “Sanctuary Cities” law was enacted. Prior to the passage of the law, only 29 of Florida’s 67 counties had full compliance with ICE detainer requests and various cities across the state chose to look the other way on immigration status. That’s what brought about the push for the ban in the Florida legislature. After passing in the 2019 session the law took effect October 1st 2019. So, where do we stand with the policy which holds local officials accountable if they violate the state law?
According to the Center for Immigration Studies, there are no current sanctuary governments within Florida. The law appears to have worked. According to CIS there are currently 11 “Sanctuary states” to go along with dozens of additional sanctuary cities across the country. You might be surprised to know Oregon has taken the lead in sanctuary governments with 32, although if you consider what’s tolerated in Portland, perhaps not. It's followed by California with 20. It’s nice to see Florida’s no longer represented on the map. It also shows the impact of meaningful policy to hold local officials accountable for tolerating and/or encouraging lawlessness.
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