They protest with “day without immigrants” in Florida against DeSantis | News

Workers across the state of Florida (southern US) were absent this Thursday from construction sites and harvest fields, while a large number of restaurants, shops and other small establishments did not open their doors in protest of a new state law imposing restrictions on immigrants living in the country without authorization.

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According to local press reports, in the Orlando metropolitan area, dozens of protesters, including some trucks with small construction cranes, gathered in protest at a major intersection located outside the office of a state legislator who promoted the measure. .

For their part, in Immokalee, an area in southwestern Florida known for its tomato crops, hundreds of protesters, many of them accompanied by their families, marched three kilometers around the town with banners and shouting slogans against the Florida governor and candidate President Ron DeSantis.

In Fort Lauderdale, opponents of the measure chanted slogans and waved flags outside Isis Córdova's Latino soup kitchen, which remained closed in protest.

The law that Governor DeSantis signed into law last month strengthens his immigrant removal program and limits social services for immigrants who do not have permanent legal status.

The legislation also increases the requirements for establishments with more than 25 employees to use E-Verify, a federal system that determines whether an employee can legally work in the United States.

Another provision requires hospitals that accept Medicaid to include a citizenship question on their intake forms, a requirement critics say is intended to discourage migrants living in the US illegally from seeking medical care.

Last month, the Latino civil rights group LULAC issued a recommendation that Hispanics refrain from traveling to the state, warning that the new law marginalizes migrant communities and is immoral.

Other civil rights groups, including the Naacp and the Human Rights Campaign, have also recommended against traveling to Florida, arguing that new laws and policies by DeSantis and Republican lawmakers are "blatantly hostile to African-Americans, people of color, and individuals." LGTBIQ+”.

DeSantis launched his campaign last week for the 2024 Republican Party presidential nomination.