After Judge halts immigration law, Miami groups rally to demand Gov. DeSantis comply

Progressive groups are holding a noon rally Thursday outside a Miami courthouse to demand that Gov. Ron DeSantis and Attorney General James Uthmeier comply with a court order blocking enforcement of Florida’s controversial new immigration law.

Federal Judge Kathleen Williams last month issued a temporary injunction against the law (SB 4C) which mandates imprisonment for being in Florida illegally and capital punishment for undocumented immigrants who commit capital crimes.

That order has since been extended, and Uthmeier has filed an appeal. DeSantis has vowed to take the case to the U.S. Supreme Court if need be.

Williams late last month opined that the plaintiffs who sued over the law — the Florida Immigrant Coalition (FLIC), Farmworker Association of Florida and two individuals — were correct that SB 4C was likely superseded by federal law and violated the federal Immigration and Nationality Act

“However, in an authoritarian turn of events,” a FLIC press note said, DeSantis and Uthmeier “have decided to take the law into their own hands and continue detaining people under this law.”

Community leaders and a coalition of civic organizations and advocacy groups — including FLIC, American Friends Service Committee, the Farmworkers Association of Florida, Florida Student Power Network, Miami Workers Center and the Family Action Movement Network — are gathering to protest what they describe as an “executive power grab” and defend “the separations of power as laid out in the Constitution.”

The rally will take place at 12 p.m. Thursday in front of the Wilkie D. Ferguson Courthouse, 400 N Miami Avenue.