Now that thanks to 12 City Council members, Jacksonville has a first-in-the-nation local immigration law, what’s next?
I mean, other than the legal challenges.
How about a law against murder?
While Jacksonville for years was known as the Murder Capital of Florida, we don’t have a local law against murder (and lots of serious crimes).
Of course, murder is against the law. As is the case in cities across America, we use state and sometimes federal laws to arrest and prosecute people. And in recent years, we haven’t had to do that nearly as frequently. Homicide has been on the decline, dropping last year to the lowest number in decades.
While we should applaud and celebrate this, we also should keep striving to do more. Some would suggest measures involving police, the state attorney’s office, community organizations and so on — without even thinking to suggest an unnecessary new local law.
But maybe now that some of our council members have proudly made history with a local immigration law, they will introduce a local law against murder — one that basically duplicates laws already on the books, only with lesser penalties — and then say that anyone who doesn’t support this law clearly supports murder and murderers, and that it would be “cowardly” for a mayor not to sign such a new law.
Jacksonville Illegal Immigration Act
That is, in essence, what happened with Ordinance #2025-0147, known as the Jacksonville Illegal Immigration Act.
Council members shot down the idea of agreeing just to the part of the bill that provided funding for the Jacksonville Sheriff’s Office to buy more fingerprint scanners. They said if we didn’t do something no other city had ever done — with a mandatory 30-day jail sentence for undocumented adult immigrants who enter the city (after a new Florida law included a mandatory nine-month prison sentence) — we were putting up a welcome sign for illegal immigration.
That passed 12-5. And when Mayor Donna Deegan opted not to sign or veto the bill — allowing it to become law without her signature, saying it was “performative not substantive” — Council members who supported the bill reacted quite strongly.
There had been speculation that Deegan might veto it. When that didn’t happen, the bill’s supporters celebrated it becoming law, because that’s what they truly cared about, right?
OK, that wasn’t exactly the impression they gave. Their reaction was more about the mayor not signing the bill. Council member Ron Salem called it “cowardly behavior” and Council Vice President Kevin Carrico, who introduced the bill, said: “Punting and playing politics on an issue as critical as this is disappointing — but it’s still a victory.”
So now that we have this victory, maybe the council members behind this bill — who clearly would never play politics with critical issues, right? — will turn their attention to introducing new local laws for other serious issues.
Murder, drug trafficking, battery, DUI, arson, money laundering, corporate fraud and on and on.
There are so many things that are against the law — but not necessarily a Jacksonville law.
And if you’re against creating local laws for these …
From immigration to tariffs
Sure, there will be some questions about whether these new local laws are necessary, whether they are superseded by existing state and federal law, and whether they will lead to lawsuits that will cost taxpayers money that could be used elsewhere. Like programs to prevent these crimes.
But these 12 council members have proven they have the ability to ignore such irony and take bold, if sometimes contradictory, stances.
There have been instances in the past — like with a hate-crime bill last year — when some of these same council members said we didn’t need to add a local law when we had state and federal laws on the books. But times have changed. And with that in in mind, perhaps we shouldn’t stop at just adding new local ordinances for crimes.
One of the main arguments for a local law for immigration, traditionally a federal matter, was that we needed to support President Trump and his agenda. And not just by cooperating with federal agencies like ICE. We already were doing that. We needed to do more. We needed to follow in the steps of the TRUMP Act, a state law already being challenged.
Well, this past week, the president introduced a slew of new tariffs. Ignoring many of the nation’s top economists (and the stock market), he said these tariffs — “the most beautiful word in the dictionary” — will be good for American cities, from coast to coast.
With one of the nation’s largest ports here in Jacksonville, the importation of goods is a significant issue, arguably even bigger than the immigration of people.
So if, as several council members have said repeatedly, we want to support the president and his policies, shouldn’t it be time to show that support by codifying these federal tariffs with some local legislation?
Some will say that doesn’t make sense, or isn’t our place. Some may even say that the added tariffs will hurt us. But as council member Rory Diamond said while pointing to the presidential election to push for a first-in-the-nation local immigration law: “We voted for this.”
mwoods@jacksonville.com
(904) 359-4212
This article originally appeared on Florida Times-Union: Why stop at immigration? Jacksonville could add other historic and unnecessary laws | Opinion
Reporting by Mark Woods, Jacksonville Florida Times-Union / Florida Times-Union
USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect
