TALLAHASSEE, Fla. (WFLA) — Lawmakers kicked off their third special session of the year in Tallahassee Tuesday. They continued to pursue illegal immigration issues after the TRUMP Act was criticized by Governor Ron DeSantis for not being strong enough.

After weeks of escalating tensions between the governor and legislative leaders, was it all just a temporary political standoff or will they finally make progress?

“This is our second special session within 30 days to address a problem that really the federal government should be working on, so that means we have missed opportunities to focus on issues that are important to Floridians, like lowering the cost of healthcare, or their auto insurance or property insurance,” said House Minority Leader Fentrice Driskell, D-Tampa.

In the past four weeks, lawmakers have met for a special session A, B, and now C, all to take up immigration proposals, as DeSantis and legislative leaders went back and forth on whose policies were a better fit for Floridians.

DeSantis and lawmakers are now singing a different tune, some calling it teamwork while others argue the past few weeks have been a waste of time.
“I don’t know how many of you have siblings, sibling squabble sometimes, and what we’ve done is, we’ve worked our way through that. And we’ve come up with what we believe is a great couple of bills,” said Senate President Ben Albritton, R-Wauchula. “I feel good about it, and no I don’t think there is going to be carryover.”

In what’s being described as a “team effort” both chambers have filed three pieces of legislation blending the governor’s and legislature’s policies.
“We have a great team. At the end of the day this is a good bill. This is a great bill. What we passed a couple weeks ago was the strongest immigration bill that’s ever been passed in the history of Florida, in the history of the country. This makes it even stronger,” said State Senator Joe Gruters, R-Sarasota.

Republicans are calling this a unified effort, at last. While Democrats claim it’s just a costly exercise in futility for taxpayers.

“A lot of time has been wasted on this while the Republicans in the legislature and the governor tries to suck up to Donald Trump,” Driskell said. “We’re elected to do a job here, and that’s to look out for Floridians, to help every Floridian enjoy the freedom to be healthy, prosperous, and safe, and Republicans have missed out big on that.”

To support the Trump administration, the bills up for debate this week contain legislation that criminalizes illegal entry into Florida, mandates the death penalty for illegal immigrants convicted of capital offenses, ends in-state tuition at colleges and universities and removes the role of immigration officer from the commissioner of agriculture, a move DeSantis opposed.

“The governor wanted it to be a deep-state employee, we wanted it to be an elected official. Where we’ve landed the plane is it will not be the governor’s responsibility, it will be the cabinets responsibility,” said State Senator Randy Fine, R-Brevard. “The governor will be one of the four people on the cabinet who gets to give input, but the Cabinet has to work unanimously in order to set that policy.”  

Governor DeSantis says it has his full support, if the proposals remain as are presented.

“All in all, I think this is really, really strong, I commend the legislature for stepping up to the plate. If they’re able to pass the proposals as presented now, they can expect my strong support. Now is the time for us to get this done,” DeSantis wrote on X.