Florida cooperation with immigration enforcement sparks fears people will disappear into jails

MIAMI (AP) — As Florida law enforcement agencies work with federal immigration officials, family members and immigrants’ rights advocates worry that people will disappear into county jail systems despite the state’s expansive public record laws.

Miami-Dade officials said during a Thursday commission meeting that they are committed to transparency and will continue to follow state laws regarding the release of information about inmates. But one section of an agreement with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement designates all records and information created under the agreement as federal records, and some observers say ICE would have the final say on what information is made public, including whether a person is even in custody.

That could be a huge problem, said William Mann, an attorney with the Community Justice Project.

“I think the concerns that many folks have would be that they (county officials) would use this language that’s in this basic ordering agreement … to prevent loved ones, family members, friends, advocates and journalists from accessing information,” Mann said. “Meaning that they would disappear into the Miami-Dade system if they were technically an ICE prisoner.”

ICE officials confirmed receipt of emails seeking comment on the issue, but did not offer any comment on the issue.

Immigration enforcement evolves

Under Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis, local and state officials must take a much more aggressive role in supporting federal immigration enforcement, which has ramped up since President Donald Trump’s return to office in January.

A law 2022 law expanded the state’s ban on so-called sanctuary policies and required agencies that operate county detention facilities to enter into agreements with ICE that empower local officers to identify and process “removable aliens” in their jails.

Another measure signed into law this year requires officials responsible for overseeing local or state law enforcement to use their “best efforts” to support federal immigration enforcement. Upon the request of a federal agency, county detention centers are also required to provide a list of “all inmates” and “any information” about each one’s immigration status.

“Today, the Florida Legislature has passed the strongest legislation to combat illegal immigration of any state in the entire country,” DeSantis said earlier this year. “We are ahead of the curve on ending the illegal immigration crisis.”

Florida requires local support of federal immigration enforcement

Local elected officials who initially balked at signing cooperation agreements with ICE have been threatened by the state attorney general with removal from office.

At Thursday’s Miami-Dade commission meeting, the board was scheduled to vote on new provisions for the county’s existing ICE agreement but ultimately deferred and chose to let Mayor Daniella Levine Cava ratify the deal herself.

Levine Cava told people who attended the hearing that she had no choice in the matter: “This is the law of Florida, and it was required that this agreement be signed.”

She and several commissioners noted that any public records the county has jurisdiction over would continue to be publicly available.

While officials in Miami-Dade have said they are committed to transparency, federal inmates, including people on immigration holds, had not been appearing in Orange County jail records until just last week.

Difficulty tracking records

Ericka Gómez-Tejeda, organizing director for Hope Community Center, said officials in the central Florida county took the position that the federal records were not covered by state open records laws, meaning immigrants were effectively disappearing into the system.

Gómez-Tejeda pointed to the case of Esvin Juarez, who was arrested and deported to Guatemala this month before his family and attorney even knew where he was being held. Making it difficult to track detained immigrants is intentional, she said.

“It’s working to the advantage of people’s due process being violated,” Gómez-Tejeda said.

Orange County Mayor Jerry Demings directed the jail to begin posting information about ICE detainees last week, but Gómez-Tejeda said that might not help inmates were arrested in other counties or states before being taken to Orange County.

“We have people who have been sent to four or five different detention centers,” Gómez-Tejeda said. “And each state that you go into, that family then needs to identify an attorney that will then do their representation and their paperwork. So it puts an onerous responsibility on the families.”

Democratic congressman proposes bill to stop unlawful detention

U.S. Rep. Maxwell Frost, a Democrat who represents the Orlando area, introduced legislation this month aimed at stopping unlawful detention and ending detainee mistreatment. It would require all ICE facilities to publicly report who is being detained, as well as where, when and why.

“This bill won’t fix everything, but if Donald Trump and his allies think these policies are defensible, then they shouldn’t be afraid to tell the public exactly what they’re doing,” Frost said. “If they’re proud of it, they’ll report it. If they’re ashamed, they need to end it.”

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Associated Press writer Kate Payne in Tallahassee contributed.