Ron DeSantis Wants Very Own Chinese Exclusion Act

Playing the classics!

Photo:  John Spade, Creative Commons License 2.0 

Fresh on the heels/heel turn of his stupid fight with Disney, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis seems to have found another strategy to be awful to Floridians and to damage Florida's economy in the pursuit of the 2024 GOP nomination. The Florida state House yesterday passed a bill aimed at preventing the Chinese Communist Party from buying land in Florida, but goes well beyond that by forbidding anyone who's "domiciled" in China from owning any real estate in Florida, unless they're a US citizen or permanent resident. The bill also includes other restrictions on some foreign ownership of properties near military bases or "critical infrastructure," but the blanket ban on owning any property in Florida applies only to Chinese nationals.

By golly, it's a throwback to the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882, when America decided it could admit loutish Irish, swarthy sex-crazed Italians, and anarchist Rooshians, but Chinese immigrants were some kinda threat .

Supporters of the measure, Senate Bill 264 , claim it's absolutely necessary for US national security, and for that matter some say that anyone opposing it is probably a Chinese agent too.

That's exactly the kind or rhetoric that has led real estate interests and Asian Americans in Florida to say that the bill is rooted in xenophobia, and will lead to anti-Asian discrimination, particularly since, as the Miami Herald explains, 

it would require home and land buyers to sign an affidavit that they’re not prohibited from buying land. Realtors would be subject to “civil or criminal liability” if they have “actual knowledge” that the transaction violates the law.

At hearings on the Senate version of the bill last month, the Herald notes, more than 100 people testified that they've been subjected to racist slurs already as paranoid rhetoric about China "gobbling up" huge tracts of US land has ramped up in rightwing media. On Saturday, Asian Americans across Florida rallied against the bill, arguing that it will lead to stereotyping and more acts of discrimination, and that it could imperil their own small businesses if they run afoul of the law, which requires Chinese "domiciled" owners to divest their Florida properties within two years. 

We are not a real estate lawyer, but we can imagine how that could screw with a small business that's operated by a Chinese American family but owned by a relative in China. If the American branch of the family can't come up with the capital to buy out the relative, or the relative doesn't want to sell — or give it as a gift and eat the tax losses — well, here come the fines, and the forfeiture of the property. The LA Times notes that such property grabs were a common feature of anti-Asian laws back in the 19th Century, too.

In an editorial yesterday, the South Florida Sun-Sentinel argued that DeSantis's push for the property ban and other anti-immigrant legislation will "cast a spotlight on anyone who talks with an accent. Or wears clothes that reflect a different heritage. Or speaks a language other than English," regardless of their actual citizenship or immigration status, which of course is the point for DeSantis.

The editorial argues that the impact of the bill will be pretty obvious:

Anyone who looks Asian will become much more likely to be questioned or turned away from financial transactions, and potentially have their homes or businesses seized. We can’t imagine anything in modern law that comes close to that.

Now, sure, realtors who simply refuse to sell to Asian Americas may then face discrimination lawsuits, but they may end up trying to balance which set of potential legal penalties they'd rather face. Discrimination suits have only civil penalties, while knowingly selling land in violation of the law would also have criminal penalties.

As we mention, the prospect of being in jeopardy for good faith business transactions has the Florida real estate bidniss worried too, and those folks have some serious economic interests in the state.

Bizarrely, some Florida pols are suggesting that the bill is actually super popular with Chinese Americans, but that you're only seeing protests by opponents because that's exactly what the CCP wants, and welcome back to McCarthyism. State Rep. David Borrero (R) insisted that "Chinese Americans and Chinese residents who are here in Florida have been silenced, likely by China, for merely speaking out in support of this bill," and Democratic co-sponsor Katherine Waldron

told lawmakers that she heard the protesters were bused in from Texas. She and Borrero said they know of Chinese Americans who have been threatened from speaking in favor of the bill and silenced on WeChat, the dominant phone app in China.

“Do not be intimidated by the vocal and aggressive actors we’ve seen in the past few weeks, who do not have our country’s best interests in mind,” Waldron said. “The communist threat to our nation is real.”

Ergo, no "good" Asian Americans really oppose the bill; those people saying it'll lead to discrimination are OUTSIDE AGITATORS AND COMMUNIST AGENTS TRYING TO WHIP UP FEAR BECAUSE THEY HATE AMERICA. Please remain calm and purge them, so we can institute government by conspiracy theory.

The Miami Herald   helpfully fact checks that claim about non-Floridians testifying against the bill, noting that

 Records from the meeting show that nearly all of the opponents of the bill listed Florida addresses, and several were quickly verified through home ownership records. Several of the speakers said they were professors at Florida universities.

DeSantis has not yet demanded an investigation into whether the Miami Herald is secretly run by the Chinese Communist Party, but for all we know he's too busy drafting a ban on any cast members at Walt Disney World depicting characters from Mulan. 

SB 264 doesn't only direct its fear toward China, although Chinese nationals who "domicile" in China are the only people outright banned from owning property in Florida. The bill originally prohibited nationals of "countries of concern" — Russia, Cuba, Venezuela, Syria, Iran, and North Korea, just in case there are any property moguls from Pyongyang — from owning land within 20 miles of any "military installation or critical infrastructure," like airports, refineries, or power plants, but the House amended that to just one mile, so the Senate will have to pass the revised version again before it goes to DeSantis for a signature. Current targeted owners of such properties would also have to divest them within two years of the bill becoming law.

Yr Wonkette would say more about what a terrible idea this law is, but we have to hurry up and meet with our CCP spymaster soon, comrades. Why don't you play some solitaire to pass the time? 

[ National Archives / Miami Herald / Sun-Sentinel / LAT / Florida SB 264 / Photo:  John Spade, Creative Commons License 2.0 ]

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