JACKSONVILLE, Fla. — Action News Jax has learned that the University of North Florida has signed a pending agreement with ICE that would permit certain members of the Campus Police Department to carry out immigration enforcement on campus.
>>> STREAM ACTION NEWS JAX LIVE <<<
[DOWNLOAD: Free Action News Jax app for alerts as news breaks]
ANJ obtained a copy of an MOA from the federal government to the University of North Florida that states ICE, “and the University of North Florida Police Department (UNFPD), pursuant to which ICE delegates to nominated, trained, and certified officers or employees … the authority to perform certain immigration enforcement functions as specified herein.”
“It’s a memo of agreement between UNF and ICE so that ICE can come in and train certain designated UNF campus cops to work on ICE’s behalf,” said Immigration Attorney Rebecca Black.
The move comes after Governor Ron DeSantis announced an additional agreement directing Florida law enforcement to work with ICE to execute functions of immigration enforcement within the state.
Other Universities across the state including the University of Florida, have already signed this agreement.
Rebecca Black is an Immigration Attorney. We asked her what impact this new policy will have.
“If they see or if they think somebody is on campus undocumented...they can detain them,” said Black. “They can fingerprint them and run them through whatever the ICE database is and they’re supposed to detain them and then transport them to a designated ICE facility.”
Lesley Crichton is a student at UNF. She is from Brazil but moved to the United States in 2019 when she was in High School with her father. Her mother wasn’t able to come until four years later. She was shocked to hear that UNF would sign an agreement like this.
“This is insane,” said Crichton. “I came to UNF because it’s a very accepting place. That’s the whole thing UNF always promotes. So, it’s absurd to hear that they would go with something like that after priding themselves and being so accepting of everybody, regardless of everything, honestly.”
Right now, UNF is waiting for ICE’s signature for the agreement to become finalized.
[SIGN UP: Action News Jax Daily Headlines Newsletter]
Click here to download the free Action News Jax news and weather apps, click here to download the Action News Jax Now app for your smart TV and click here to stream Action News Jax live.
