(30 May 2023)
FOR CLEAN VERSION SEE STORY NUMBER: 4437293
ASSOCIATED PRESS
Homestead, Florida – 27 May 2023
1. Various protest march
ANNOTATION: Hundreds marched in the agricultural town of Homestead to protest new restrictions on undocumented immigrants in Florida.
ANNOTATION: A new law targets their ability to enter the state, access certain social services and find employment.
2. SOUNDBITE (Spanish) Raina, agricultural worker from El Salvador, asked not to use last name:
“My daughters need (my) support, they need to study in order to have a better future. I am afraid to return to my country and for my daughters to return again to where they had to suffer violence.”
3. Various people praying
ANNOTATION: The new law was signed by Gov. Ron DeSantis, who has made immigration a top priority in his bid for the Republican presidential nomination.
4. Various boy holding sign saying “We are not eligal, we are undocument.”
ANNOTATION: The Florida governor has framed the law as a counter to what he calls “reckless federal open-border policies.”
5. Women hugging
6. SOUNDBITE (Spanish) Virginia, activist with WeCount worker’s center, asked not to use last name:
“Now is the moment in which we all must unite in a single force to tell this governor that we are a strong force, that we immigrants are united, are integral for the Florida economy and that we are here and are not leaving.”
7. Various protest
ANNOTATION: Critics say the law may negatively impact Florida’s agricultural, construction and tourism industries amid a national labor shortage.
ANNOTATION: They add that it will divide families and dissuade undocumented immigrants from seeking medical care.
8. Wide Vice Mayor of Homestead Julio Guzman chanting
9. SOUNDBITE (English) Julio Guzman, Vice Mayor of Homestead:
“I think this law creates division. I think this law creates confusion. It breaks up families, and I don't support the law. So I want to say that the city of Homestead has come together and we are united.”
10. Various march
ANNOTATION: Meanwhile, some activists have called for a labor strike and a boycott of Florida by truck drivers.
ANNOTATION: The Migration Policy Institutes estimates there are 772,000 undocumented immigrants in Florida.
STORYLINE:
Hundreds of immigrants and their families marched in the agricultural town of Homestead on Saturday in protest of a new law placing additional restrictions on undocumented immigration.
The law signed earlier this month by Gov. Ron DeSantis expands requirements for businesses with more than 25 staffers to use E-Verify, a federal system that determines if employees can legally work in the U.S. It prohibits local governments from providing money to organizations that issue identification cards to people illegally in the country and invalidates out-of-state driver’s licenses held by undocumented immigrants.
Another provision requires hospitals that accept Medicaid to include a citizenship question on intake forms, which critics said was intended to dissuade undocumented immigrants from seeking medical care.
Undocumented immigrants, who are widely represented in Florida’s agricultural, construction and tourism industries, say the law is discriminatory against law-abiding workers integral for the state’s economy.
“I think this law creates division. I think this law creates confusion. It breaks up families, and I don't support the law,” Julio Guzman, the Vice Mayor of Homestead, told The Associated Press after Saturday’s rally.
AP video shot by Daniel Kozin
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