On Wednesday, Republican Florida Governor Ron DeSantis signed anti-illegal immigration legislation into law as President Biden’s illegal immigration crisis is expected to worsen dramatically when Title 42 ends this week.
“The Biden Border Crisis has wreaked havoc across the United States and has put Americans in danger,” said DeSantis. “In Florida, we will not stand idly by while the federal government abandons its lawful duties to protect our country. The legislation I signed today gives Florida the most ambitious anti-illegal immigration laws in the country, fighting back against reckless federal government policies and ensuring the Florida taxpayers are not footing the bill for illegal immigration.”
As explained in a press release from DeSantis’ office, the “legislation will require private employers with 25 or more employees to use the E-Verify system for new employees, beginning on July 1, 2023. This bill also expands penalties for employers who fail to comply with E-Verify requirements, including the possible suspension and revocation of employer licenses and the imposition of specific penalties on employers that knowingly employ illegal aliens.”
“Additionally, this legislation creates a third-degree felony for an unauthorized alien to knowingly use a false ID document to gain employment and prohibits a county or municipality from providing funds to any person or organization for the purpose of issuing IDs or other documents to an illegal alien,” the press release added.
The legislation comes the day before Title 42 is set to end. The Department of Homeland Security has previously warned that the end of Title 42 will lead to as many as 18,000 migrants attempting to illegally cross the southern border each day, according to an internal document obtained by ABC News.
“The DHS Office of Immigration Statistics (OIS) produced projections for post-Title 42 Southwest Border encounters describing low, medium, high, or very high encounter scenarios,” the document says. “These scenarios underpin planning assumptions that generate requirements which in turn drive operational execution. Based on these projections the SBCC is currently planning for 6,000, 12,000 (high) and 18,000 (very high) encounters per day.”
