DeSantis sets pace for GOP governors on immigration

President Trump, working to curb illegal immigration on the federal level, has found an unparalleled partner in Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, who is leading the country’s preeminent test of immigration enforcement at the state level.

Mr. DeSantis, a Republican, has signed stiff legislation criminalizing illegal immigrants’ entry into Florida and ordering state and local law enforcement to sign cooperative agreements with federal authorities to enforce immigration laws to the maximum extent.

On Thursday, he stood with Department of Homeland Security officials to announce Operation Tidal Wave. This massive federal-state effort captured 1,120 illegal immigrants with criminal records over one week last month. He called it a model for other states.

On Friday, Mr. DeSantis released his blueprint for the next steps. He said he was ready to open temporary detention facilities, deputize state National Guard judge advocate general lawyers to serve as immigration judges to speed up cases, and have Florida arrange for deportation flights to get migrants on their way home.

He said he was paving the way for other states.

“I think this really represents a model,” Mr. DeSantis told reporters. “My hope is that as we’re doing this, then, you’ve got voters, particularly Republican voters in these other states saying, ‘Hey, why aren’t you guys doing this, why aren’t you doing what Florida’s doing?’”

He said banning sanctuary jurisdictions and allowing cooperation with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement aren’t enough.

“You really, to be in the game, you need to be partnering with ICE and you need to be conducting your own operations,” he said.

Mr. DeSantis said that Mr. Trump had performed a seismic turnaround at the southern border and that “it’s pretty close to 100% secure.” Still, he said, that’s only part of the answer.

He said state enforcement can help oust the millions of illegal immigrants who settled during the Biden years.

“We just have way more people that are interacting in the community, that come into contact with illegal aliens more than the federal government does,” he said. “If we’re on the team and we’re supplementing these efforts, you’re going to see those [deportation] numbers go up dramatically.”

The most significant move is directing state and local law enforcement to sign partnerships, known as 287(g) agreements, with ICE. These allow police to help enforce immigration law more directly.

When President Biden took office, 148 state and local departments had 287(g) agreements. He cut that to 135.

In a little more than 100 days under Mr. Trump, that number has grown to 517 agreements, including 241 task force memo agreements, the most aggressive version that Mr. Biden canceled altogether. Another 62 agreements were pending at the start of this month.

Mr. DeSantis said Florida accounts for most of the new sign-ups.

His state enforcement blueprint also calls for training lawyers from the Florida National Guard Judge Advocate General’s staff to act as immigration judges to help federal officials speed deportation cases. The state has vendors ready to provide up to 10,000 beds to help ICE with migrant detention.

Mr. DeSantis also offered Florida’s help in carrying out deportations. He said the state has vendors “on standby” to fly people within the U.S. or back to their countries of origin.

Other Republican governors also have been active.

During the Biden years, Texas Gov. Greg Abbott became the chief opposition voice by dint of his state’s lengthy border and surge of illegal immigrants.

His program that bused some of them directly to sanctuary cities, spreading a small bit of Texas’ pain, worked beyond all measure. New York, Chicago and the District of Columbia howled that Mr. Abbott was unfair, but they began to chide Mr. Biden for the crisis.

Mr. DeSantis took the busing idea and went a step further. Florida intercepted several dozen newly arriving migrants in Texas who had planned to head to Florida and instead flew them to Martha’s Vineyard, Massachusetts, a playground for the liberal rich.

It went over like dropping a dead rat into the community swimming pool.

“That really changed the dynamic in terms of public perception,” the governor said Friday. “To have a wealthy enclave like Martha’s Vineyard freak out when they have 50 illegals show up, and literally declare a state of emergency and get the National Guard to deport them off the island immediately. It just showed these were people who wanted an open border for everybody else but didn’t want to live with it.”

At one point, Haiti’s instability threatened to produce a new wave of migrants arriving by sea. Mr. DeSantis said the Biden administration operated under a wet-foot, dry-foot policy: If migrants were interdicted on the water, they were returned, but if they reached land, they were generally caught and released.

With the Coast Guard overstretched, the governor ordered the Florida National Guard to patrol the skies and spot migrant boats. He deployed state forces to help interdict them before they reached land.

“We were able to supplement the Coast Guard, and we’ve now gotten that down to a pretty good science where we’re able to stop almost all of these boats,” he said. “We’ve been in this fight for a long time in Florida.”

Mr. DeSantis’ efforts have been met with stark predictions of an economic collapse for Florida. When Florida moved to expand work opportunities for teenagers, critics said the state was turning to children to fill jobs vacated by migrants.

UnidosUS, a Hispanic advocacy group formerly known as the National Council of La Raza, said the governor’s earlier actions had cost the state tourism dollars and threatened tax receipts.

The governor said those “doomsday scenarios” haven’t come to pass and have led to some early returns.

He attributed savings from emergency room visits to a decline in illegal immigrants taking advantage of uncompensated care after Florida’s 2023 enactment of mandatory E-Verify, which allows businesses to vet new hires’ legal work status.

He also pointed to effects elsewhere.

“I can definitely say wages have gone up,” he said. “Some of them may have to pay a little bit more to hire a legal worker, but that’s a good thing.”