More than 10,000 immigrants have been arrested by state and local Florida officers since last August and some of the governor’s own supporters are having second thoughts.
A tinted window. A busted tail light. A turn signal skipped at the wrong corner. In Florida in 2026, any of those can end with a knock on the car window that has nothing to do with traffic.
Under Operation Tidal Wave, Florida’s unprecedented state-federal immigration enforcement partnership, at least 1,800 Highway Patrol troopers are trained to enforce immigration law alongside their daily duties. Since last August, the State Board of Immigration Enforcement has logged more than 10,000 arrests by local agencies alone not counting ICE. The majority were made during routine traffic stops.
The program is the most aggressive state-level immigration enforcement in the country. All 67 Florida counties now have formal 287(g) partnership agreements with ICE, a requirement Governor DeSantis backed with the threat of removing non-compliant officials from office. Jacksonville went even further, passing a city ordinance that makes being undocumented a criminal offense.
“There are those here that are working hard. They have their kids in college or in school. They’re going to church on Sunday. They’re not violating the law. They are living the American dream.” Polk County Sheriff Grady Judd
That quote didn’t come from a protest rally. It came from one of DeSantis’ most reliably conservative sheriffs, speaking at a state immigration board meeting. Judd, who said he still strongly supports targeting criminals, told the board that “maybe there needs to be a path” for law-abiding immigrants a remarkable statement from a man who has cheerfully posed with ICE agents for years.
In Lake Worth Beach, a majority-Hispanic city in Palm Beach County, advocates at the Guatemalan-Maya Center say the fear is visible. “They’ve been the most aggressive in our cities,” said Mariana Blanco, the center’s director of operations. “They’re the ones that are targeting, racially profiling our people.”
Surveys of Florida law enforcement agencies show immigrant crime victims are increasingly unwilling to call 911, worried they’ll end up detained instead of helped. Community trust, built carefully over years in South Florida’s diverse neighborhoods from Hialeah to Immokalee is eroding by the traffic stop.
A February–March poll found likely midterm voters in Florida split nearly 50-50 on Trump’s handling of immigration. The Free State of Florida’s toughest test isn’t in a courtroom. It’s at the next traffic light.
