HOMESTEAD, Fla. — It's an immigration crackdown across Florida as Governor Ron DeSantis and Homeland Security Senior Counselor Keith Pearson announced a new program they say will increase the arrests of undocumented migrants with criminal records.
The announcement came at a joint press conference at the Homestead Air Reserve Base in Miami-Dade County Wednesday in front of a room full of law enforcement.
"This is a task force model which will lead to street level enforcement," DeSantis said.
The program, which they referred to as 287(g), is an added section to the Immigration and Nationality Act made up of three models: a jail enforcement model, a task force model and a warrant officer model.
The warrant office model allows ICE to train local and state law enforcement to handle the same duties as federal agents.
"To apprehend aliens with serious criminal records," Pearson said. "Criminals have no place in the homeland."
"When they're out on routine patrol, they'll be able to do these types of routine investigations and, if so, make arrests and enforce these warrants," St Lucie County Sheriff Richard Del Toro said.
Del Toro is one of all 67 Florida Sheriff's who Pearson said agreed to participate in the voluntary program.
WATCH: St. Lucie County Sheriff Richard Del Toro speaks on efforts to further crack down on illegal immigration
Del Toro told WPTV he believes the initiative will help keep St Lucie County, which currently has 67 ICE holds, safe.
Pearson and DeSantis said the program's jail enforcement model would help process undocumented immigrants with pending criminal records.
The task enforcement model would allow deputies to arrest undocumented immigrants who have outstanding federal warrants.
"There are 700,000 new federal warrants that are put in the system that if we come across someone right now on a traffic stop, we cannot arrest them on those warrants because we don't have the federal powers to do that," Del Toro said. "This is going to give us the power to do that."
Tiffany Hankins is the Director of Policy and Politics for the Florida Immigrant Coalition. She told WPTV she has multiple concerns over the program, fearing it would further burden law enforcement and further perpetuate a fear of law enforcement among the immigrant community, something Hankins said she's already seen a dramatic increase in.
"There is absolutely an increase in fear and a tendency for people to start living their lives more underground, more in the shadows," Hankins said. "I absolutely do not believe that the American people and also rank and file police officers want to see families who have put down their roots— they don't want to see those families torn apart."
Multiple state agencies, including the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission, Florida Department of Law Enforcement and Florida Highway Patrol are also participating in the training. As for when that training will be, Del Toro said he's waiting on further guidance.
"The reality is, the American people spoke very clearly: they're sick of having an open border and they're sick of having the rule of law being ignored," DeSantis said.
