The current governor of Florida, Ron DeSantis, is reportedly pushing for some of the most stringent immigration legislation in more than a decade.
He is calling on state lawmakers to enact an extensive package that would toughen the state’s rules on immigration.
As part of the measures, undocumented students in the state of Florida may reportedly no longer be eligible for in-state tuition rates if the comprehensive immigration reform legislative package proposed by Governor Ron DeSantis is passed.
Undocumented students and beneficiaries of the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program (DACA), which shields those who came to the country as children from the threat of deportation, were granted access to in-state tuition rates under a law that was passed in 2014 and would be repealed under the proposed legislation.
Rick Scott, who served as governor before Ron DeSantis and is now a senator for the Republican party, was responsible for the passage of the previous statute.
In addition, this immigration package would make it a felony to harbor or transport an undocumented immigrant within the state, it would render undocumented immigrants’ out-of-state driver’s licenses null and void, and it would mandate that hospitals inquire about the immigration status of their patients and report the information to the state.
These are just some of the provisions that would be included in the landmark bill, which many critics are decrying as the ‘toughest’ in the nation.
It is anticipated that the proposal would become law within the next few weeks and would be one of the strictest immigration laws to be introduced in more than a decade.
In February, the governor of Florida made the initial announcement of these far-reaching ideas as a strategy to “combat Biden’s Border Crisis.”
There are around 40,000 undocumented students enrolled in higher education in the state of Florida.
Among these students, little more than 12,000 are eligible for the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program (DACA).
Republicans have supermajorities in both the state House and Senate, making the passage of the bill far easier than many may have anticipated.
[READ MORE: Trump Attempts to Discourage DeSantis From Running in 2024 in New Truth Social Post]
