After a summer full of rioting and looting in many Democrat-run cities, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis is looking to expand the Stand Your Ground Law and has drafted an “anti-mob” legislation. This allows armed citizens to shoot suspected looters or anyone engaged in criminal activity The draft of the bill was in response directly to the police-brutality protests driven by the radical left that allowed vigilantes to justify their actions after the death of George Floyd.
The bill also expands the list of forcible felonies, which then justifies the use of force against people who engage in criminal activity. It allows you to protect a business within 500 feet of a “violent or disorderly assembly” and justifies deadly force as a means to stand your ground and prevent forcible felonies. Forcible felonies include murder, manslaughter, sexual battery, robbery, kidnapping, assault, battery, aggravated stalking, carjacking, and anything involving the threat of physical force or violence against any individual. The bill defines looting as a form of burglary and makes blocking traffic as a third-degree felony.
The bill offers immunity to drivers who have no intention of injuring or killing protesters who block traffic on highways and roads. It also allows the state to withhold funds from local governments that cut police budgets since they are intentionally stripping their communities of public safety.
A draft of the bill was submitted to Florida’s state Senate Committee on Criminal Justice and the House Judiciary Committee.
There have been a number of attorneys concerned over the expansion of Florida’s Stand Your Ground law. Some have claimed that this would incite more violence and give leeway to grant immunity to someone they believed acted in self-defense before letting the case reach the jury. Gov. DeSantis believes differently. He believes that what he is proposing will enact the strongest pro-law enforcement, anti-rioting, anti-looting legislation anywhere in the country.
However, many lawyers have pushed for expanded bills since police-brutality protests began earlier this summer and the radical left did nothing to stop it. They even openly supported the violence at one point, saying to do “whatever it takes” to rebuild America and away from systemic racism. This resulted in burnt-down communities, destroyed minority-owned businesses, and too many victims who were just in the wrong place at the wrong time.
President Trump won Florida over in this year’s presidential election with one of the largest numbers of Hispanic voter turnouts. It was the best margin a Republican presidential candidate has seen in Miami-Dade County in 16 years. Even though President Trump had lost by double digits 4 years ago, Republicans won almost every competitive state House seat on the Miami-Dade ballot.
A political shift is in the air and people are demanding law and order now more than ever.
