By Kanishka Singh
WASHINGTON, April 6 (Reuters) – Florida Governor Ron DeSantis signed into law a measure that gave him and other state officials the power to designate groups as “terrorist organizations” and expel students who support them, with rights groups saying the law will chill free speech.
The law empowers the state’s chief of domestic security, governor and cabinet to designate any organization they determine engages in extremist acts as a “terrorist organization.”
After such a designation, the group can be forcibly dissolved and face a freeze on state funding, according to the legislation. It also says that students shall be expelled from their institution if they “promoted a domestic terrorist organization or a foreign terrorist organization.”
DeSantis, a Republican, signed the law on Monday.
The Council on American-Islamic Relations, one of the country’s most prominent Muslim rights groups, called the law “draconian” and unconstitutional in a Monday statement.
Late last year, DeSantis signed an executive order designating CAIR as a “foreign terrorist organization.” CAIR sued over the designation and a judge eventually blocked the order.
Free speech group PEN America says the measure signed by DeSantis “could chill free speech by placing unprecedented pressure on individuals to avoid speaking, organizing, or engaging with certain viewpoints.”
In November, Texas also designated CAIR as a “terrorist organization,” alleging the rights group had ties to extremists. CAIR sued over that designation as well and dismissed the claims.
Darryl Li, a legal scholar at the University of Chicago, and Shirin Sinnar, a professor of law at Stanford Law School, said in a joint piece in February that efforts by Texas and Florida towards such designations “could lay the groundwork for even more sweeping forms of authoritarianism.”
Republican President Donald Trump’s administration and some Republican-governed states have cracked down against left-leaning organizations and pro-Palestinian groups that they cast as extremist, antisemitic and anti-American.
Those groups dismiss the allegations and say the crackdown violates free speech and due process. They also say that those states and the Trump administration conflate pro-Palestinian advocacy with support for extremism, and criticism of U.S. ally Israel’s assault on Gaza and its occupation of Palestinian territories with antisemitism.
Trump’s attempts to deport some protesters and freeze funds for universities where protests were held have faced judicial roadblocks.
PEN America Florida Director William Johnson said the Florida legislation “opens the door for Florida students to face punishment for constitutionally protected speech.”
DeSantis cast the legislation as a framework to combat extremism and have accountability in the education system.
(Reporting by Kanishka Singh in Washington; Editing by Aurora Ellis)
