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During a news conference to announce a new collaboration with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, the mayor of Orange County, Florida, gave a stunning statement, saying his decision was made “under protest and in extreme duress.”
Mayor Jerry Demings said he’d signed a cooperation agreement due to threats from Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis and Attorney General James Uthmeier to suspend local officials from office. The agreement allows ICE to conscript local law enforcement, including correctional officers, by having them detain and transport alleged violators of immigration laws to federal detention facilities.
“Yes, I signed the damn thing because we really had to. We were put in a tough spot,” Demings said Friday at a news conference in Orlando. “I can’t let our entire board of county commissioners and myself be removed from office.” He later told a reporter, “I signed under protest and in extreme duress,” before going on to say, “I think that it was the right thing at the right time.” He noted that Orange County has never had so-called sanctuary policies and that his objections were due to staffing and budgetary issues.
The Orange County board of commissioners will vote on whether to approve the plan this week.
DeSantis has weaponized his executive power to suspend Democratic officials who didn’t align with his far-right agenda, having removed two democratically elected prosecutors since 2022.
Activists and judges alike have accused President Donald Trump’s anti-immigrant crackdown of racial profiling and dehumanizing behavior (claims the secretary of homeland security has disputed)migration advocates have made similar allegations about immigration enforcement tactics and detention conditions in Florida, where conservatives have exhibited a particular bloodlust in their desire to detain and deport immigrants — even those from communities known to support the president.
Given what appears to be growing public disapproval of the president’s anti-immigrant policies, it makes sense why local politicians like Demings might be reluctant to deepen their cooperation with ICE.
That said, DeSantis and his allies seem to have found a way to force officials to comply.