MIAMI — Miami’s elected officials heard a tsunami of opposition to the city’s partnership with Immigration and Customs Enforcement during an emotionally charged meeting Thursday that left one city commissioner who fled political persecution in Cuba with tears in his eyes.

The tense commission meeting comes as Florida continues its push to be a top collaborator on the Trump administration’s mass deportation agenda. The state leads with 287(g) agreements in the nation, with 375 active agreements between ICE and local law enforcement agencies. The 287(g) program empowers local law enforcement officers to carry out immigration enforcement actions.

The commission meeting came on the same day that the Supreme Court paved the way for the Trump administration to end deportation protections under the Temporary Protected Status program for over 350,000 Haitians and 6,000 Syrians. The decision is consequential in Florida, home to over a third of all Haitians with TPS. Haitians stripped of their status will be vulnerable to ICE detention and deportation to their Caribbean homeland, which is facing extreme gang violence, widespread hunger and political instability.

The Supreme Court decision came down during a period designated for public comment at Thursday’s Miami City Commission meeting, where more than 50 people spoke out against the city’s 287(g) agreement.

“These folks are going after families, creating widows and orphans of deportation,” Florida Rising Together’s María Rodriguez said of immigration enforcement officials. “You will have to carry that in your conscience. Decades from now, it will be looked upon shamefully.”

The city has been enrolled in the agreement for a year, voting 3-2 in June 2025 to enter the ICE partnership despite overwhelming public opposition. While the commission seats are officially nonpartisan, the vote fell along party lines.

But the political landscape in Miami has shifted since then. The city has a new mayor, Eileen Higgins, who has been a critic of the city’s decision to enroll in the 287(g) program, and newly elected Commissioner Rolando Escalona has said he is open to ending the agreement.

Commissioner Christine King asked for a discussion item about 287(g) to be added to Thursday’s meeting agenda. While King’s intention was for the city to clarify statistics around Miami police’s role in immigration enforcement, the conversation evolved into one that cut to the core of the fear and uncertainty that’s being felt across a majority-immigrant city amid a nationwide immigration crackdown.

Miami commissioners didn’t take any official action Thursday after hours of public comment against 287(g). But three of the city’s five commissioners — King, Escalona and Damian Pardo — stated on the record that they would be willing to exit the agreement, so long as it can be done legally.

City Attorney George Wysong warned commissioners of the potential consequences the Florida governor and attorney general could level against the city should it exit 287(g), such as losing state funding. Wysong said the city receives about $7.5 million from the state each year.

“$7.5 million is worth saving a life, a family,” King said. “We’ll make it up some kind of way. … We will figure it out.”

City Manager James Reyes attempted to quell concern over fears of immigration enforcement, saying Miami police are not doing any profiling, nor are they asking about a person’s immigration status. Reyes said there are currently just two Miami police officers trained under 287(g).

Reyes said the two are detectives who “perform these duties” on an as-needed basis — not full-time.

“Immigration status has had no factor whatsoever in any of the charges or detainers applied by the city of Miami Police Department since this agreement was signed,” Reyes said. “I think it’s imperative that our community understands that so that we continue to maintain the trust that we’ve built.”

But Escalona said the issue was less about the practicalities of 287(g) and more about “the fear that we see in our community.”

Escalona, a Republican who was elected in December, was visibly emotional during Thursday’s meeting. He moved to the U.S. from Cuba 12 years ago, fleeing political persecution. After arriving in the U.S., Escalona worked his way up in the restaurant industry, eventually becoming general manager of Brickell’s swanky Sexy Fish restaurant.

He said his twins, a boy and a girl, were born seven months ago.

“Two weeks after they were born, I was right there,” Escalona said, pointing to the city clerk’s office, “getting their passports. Because I was afraid. And I’m a U.S. citizen.”

He emphasized that while he supports law and order, “I think we’re going too far.”

‘It’s time to wake up’

The 287(g) program empowers local cops with some functions of federal immigration agents. That includes arresting people suspected of violating immigration law.

Gov. Ron DeSantis has been aggressive in his push for local and county governments to adopt the program. Last year, Attorney General James Uthmeier sent letters to leadership in the cities of Fort Myers and Key West after they rejected agreements. Uthmeier threatened them with removal from office and said they were violating Florida’s sanctuary city laws. Both then reversed course and voted to accept the agreements.

Florida’s sanctuary city laws forbid local governments from impeding ICE from doing its job, such as by not sharing information with the federal government. Uthmeier sent a similar letter to the Orange County Commission in July 2025, telling commissioners that they “must adopt” an addendum “to allow Corrections Officers to transport illegal aliens to approved detention facilities.”

Given DeSantis’ push for local and state cooperation on immigration enforcement, it’s possible that a revocation of the 287(g) agreement between Miami and ICE could put the city on a collision course with Tallahassee.

The city of South Miami last year had filed a lawsuit asking a federal judge to clarify whether local governments needed to enter the agreements, as DeSantis had argued. The judge dismissed it. But the mayor said he got his answer because DeSantis administration attorneys said during court hearings that not every municipality needs to team up, as long as they don’t take a stance opposing it.

Advocates say the 287(g) partnerships make immigrants afraid to report crimes, even if they are victims and witnesses, and erode community trust in policing. They also point to high-profile blunders in Florida under the guise of immigration enforcement, including the arrests of U.S. citizens by the Florida Highway Patrol. Meanwhile, lawyers and legal experts opposing the program say that immigration enforcement is the job of the federal government, not state and local governments.

Outside of City Hall on Thursday morning before the meeting kicked off, community advocacy and immigrants’ rights organizations called on the City Commission to reverse course on Miami’s adoption of the ICE partnership. They held up posters in red letters that read “Solidarity Melts ICE” and “Block 287(g).” They argued that city leaders had a responsibility to their residents and that the agreement turned any interaction with police into a potential immigration arrest.

“For those of our neighbors who are not immigrants, who feel they are not impacted by this, it’s time to wake up,” said Renata Bozzetto, deputy director of the Florida Immigrant Coalition.

Arianne Betancourt, a community advocate, said that because of her work supporting families of immigration detainees and her own father having been held at Alligator Alcatraz, she knows “exactly where people end up because of the 287(g) agreement.”

Thomas Kennedy, another advocate with the Florida Immigrant Coalition, said that Higgins had been elected on a “mandate on immigration” and a “rebuke on federal immigration enforcement.”

In February, shortly after her election, Higgins told the Miami Herald that she supports rescinding 287(g) but that it’s up to the commission to move forward with doing so. Higgins, who is currently out of the country for London Climate Action Week, doesn’t have a vote on the commission, although she can privately lobby commissioners and introduce legislation of her own.

“Not only does she refuse to put this item on the agenda,” Kennedy said, “ ... she won’t even show up here on the day it’s being discussed ... it’s an issue of priorities.”

Higgins did not immediately respond to a request for comment from the Herald.

©2026 Miami Herald. Visit at miamiherald.com. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.