DeSantis Denies Having Criminalized Homelessness

Florida Politics reports:

Gov. Ron DeSantis is defending legislation he signed this week that bans people from sleeping in public, saying it doesn’t punish the unhoused, but helps them.

“It’s not criminalizing homelessness. What they’re saying is you don’t have a right to just sleep in front of somebody’s business or you don’t have a right to just take over a street and put an encampment down,” DeSantis said.

DeSantis argued that homelessness elsewhere was a reason people came to his state in recent years, saying that “if other places around the country had done that, there probably would be a lot fewer people moving to Florida as a result.”

Read the full article. As you surely recall, DeSantis has boasted for years that Florida’s surge in population is due to to its status as a “free state,” not because new arrivals were escaping the homeless. The just-signed bill is unfunded – meaning that local municipalities must shoulder the cost of “relocating” the homeless.

‘What the bill does is, it says you have a right to take people out of the public areas and put them in a shelter.’@GovRonDeSantis rejects claim that state is ‘criminalizing homelessness.’

Reporting by @AGGancarskihttps://t.co/ZRwwm0iZXa#FlaPol pic.twitter.com/DSH1ZcfYJg

— Phil Ammann (@PhilAmmann) March 21, 2024