Controversial Florida legislation is raising alarms over issues including free speech, political persecution, surveillance, and viewpoint discrimination. But the bill’s sponsor says opponents should trust him to alter what critics charge is broad language that could be used to target alleged subversives based on their opinions.
The bill, which advanced in committee on Tuesday, “would allow secretive government surveillance and arrests of Floridians based on views, opinions or actions,” according to the Florida Trident.
The “primary mission” of what would be a new Florida Department of Law Enforcement (FDLE) unit “would include the detection, identification, and neutralization of ‘adversary intelligence entities,’ which include a ‘person whose demonstrated actions, views, or opinions are a threat of are inimical to the interests of the this state and the United States of America.’”
The bill’s sponsor, Republican state Rep. Danny Alvarez, “told the committee Tuesday that an amendment was in the works addressing concerns that he said had arisen in recent days over dangers the bill posed to free speech and risks of political persecution.”
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Rep. Alvarez says he is “very aware” of the concerns surrounding First Amendment rights. “But just understand, this is going after terrorists, nation state bad actors, not political speech.” He defended the need for the new legislation, citing the terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001.
“People are looking for boogeymen here,” Alvarez said of the bill’s critics, according to The Intercept.
“There’s no boogeyman. I’m going to strip everything that makes you question it. You just have to trust me to get to the next committee,” he said. “But while you look for boogeymen, I need to be looking for terrorists. I need to prevent the next bomb.”
Alvarez disputed critics’ concerns, telling The Intercept that his bill “does not authorize investigations based solely on speech.”
“Any action must be tied to demonstrable conduct and constitutional standards. The First Amendment remains fully intact, and the unit operates under strong statutory safeguards and oversight.”
But critics see a “civil liberties nightmare in the making that could be used to target Muslims and alleged subversives based solely on their views or opinions, much like the FBI’s notorious COINTELPRO program,” The Intercept noted.
Adversary Intelligence Entities
“According to the bill,” The Intercept reports, “adversary intelligence entities” are entities that “include but are not limited to ‘any national, foreign, multinational, friendly, competitor, opponent, adversary, or recognized enemy government or nongovernmental organization, company, business, corporation, consortium, group, agency, cell, terrorist, insurgent, guerrilla entity, or person whose demonstrated actions, views, or opinions are a threat or are inimical to the interests of this state and the United States of America.”
Bobby Block, the executive director of the Florida First Amendment Foundation, “said the bill’s sweeping language leaves open the possibility that the new unit could target people simply based on their views, citing the language about actors who hold views deemed ‘inimical’ to Florida,” meaning harmful or hostile.
“What does that mean? If I’m not a white Christian nationalist, does that mean my views are inimical to the values? It begs a lot of questions,” Block said.
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Image: Official Florida House photo
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