this is "Facing South Florida" with Jim DeFede.
>>Welcome to "Facing South Florida".
I'm Jim DeFede and the Florida legislature in Tallahassee
is fast tracking a number of bills,
including a plan to allow anyone who owns a gun
to carry it in public without a concealed weapons permit.
I spoke this week to Congresswoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz
about those efforts as well as the state's plan
to limit abortions to the first six weeks of a pregnancy.
>>But let's be very clear
on what the Republican led legislature
and Ron DeSantis are doing.
They have essentially staked out this disgusting corner
of the universe called the pro-violence legislature.
I mean, pro-violence Republicans are ramming through
permitless gun carry in the Florida legislature
to allow basically anyone to carry a gun
without a permit, without training.
And they're doing that in a state
where we had the Marjory Stoneman Douglas deadly shootings
and the Pulse nightclub shootings.
These are people who wouldn't certainly talk about this
in Orlando or in Parkland,
but they're doing the NRA's bidding
and essentially trying to ram through and rollback
the promises that they made to the Parkland families
after the Marjory Stoneman Douglas shootings.
It's disgusting.
It's dangerous.
And they should be ashamed of themselves.
And what's worse, is that they are hiding
this permitless gun carry legislation
in a so-called school safety bill which is grotesque,
because they are afraid, because they know
that the overwhelming majority of Republicans in Florida
oppose this legislation.
They're afraid to vote on it as a standalone bill.
It's a chicken move.
>>So let me just break it down a little bit.
So you're addressing specifically
the permitless carry aspect of it.
Do you also oppose the potential of lowering the age
to purchase a weapon at a gun store from 21 to 18?
>>Yeah, of course.
This is a pro-violence Republican government.
Ron DeSantis is pro-violence.
The Republican led legislature is pro-violence.
You couldn't interpret it any other way.
When they're ramming through grotesque legislation
that will ensure that more guns are on the street
in the hands of people who are untrained
dangerous individuals and we will have more deaths
in our neighborhood-
>>Let me push back a little bit
because I don't know that any legislator
would consider themselves pro-violence.
So I mean, that's your language.
I don't know that they would see this.
I would say that they would make the argument...
I'm not here to make the case for them,
but they would make the argument
that having what they call...
I had the House Speaker on my show last week.
He referred to it as a permission slip
from the government for permitless carry,
to have a concealed weapons permit
that many other states already do this.
And that, they may make the streets safer
if people are able to carry guns
who can use them responsibly.
>>Look, many of these are flip flopping Republicans
who previously voted to make sure
that we had some minimal common sense gun safety laws.
They are absolutely voting for pro-violence bills
that they would never defend in Parkland or Orlando.
They are doing the bidding of the NRA.
And if you look at the University of North Florida polling
that recently came out last week,
it shows that 62% of Republicans
strongly oppose permitless carry legislation,
strongly oppose putting more guns
into the hands of people who are untrained
and could get a gun under this Bill
with no questions asked essentially.
And then on top of that...
Thankfully President Passidomo doesn't seem
to be supportive of lowering the age to 18,
rolling back the age to 18,
but that Bill is barreling through
the House of Representatives.
And I mean, essentially what it means is
that they wanna put guns into the hands of more people,
who are less mature, and who the legislature
a few years ago in the wake
of yet another 18 year old mass murderer,
decided that that was something that did not make sense.
>>Let me just give you the argument
that Paul Renner made to me when I talked to him
about the 18 to 21 or moving it back from 21 to 18.
What he said was that when Joe Biden came into office
he had a Democratic house, a Democratic Senate.
And when they did gun legislation,
they did not raise...
Democrats did not raise the age from 18 to 21.
So if the Democratic controlled Congress and President
wasn't for raising the age from 18 to 21,
why should Florida be raising it to 21?
>>Oh please.
We just passed the Safer Communities Act
with a Democratic Congress and a Democratic President
and it was the most significant
gun safety reform in 30 years.
>>Let's turn to abortion.
Florida, it seems destined right now,
on a fast track to move the number of weeks
in which a woman can get an abortion.
It was 24 two years ago.
Last year they took it to 15.
Now they're going to six weeks,
which is virtually a ban on abortion
since a lot of women may not even know
they're pregnant within six weeks.
Your reaction to their plans with regard to abortion?
>>Look, if this legislation to basically make,
to establish a near total ban on abortion in this state,
passes, they're going to be installing a policy
that prohibits abortions before most women
even know they're pregnant.
Jim, when I found out I was pregnant
with our youngest daughter,
I was eight weeks pregnant already.
You know why?
And maybe some of these Republican male legislators,
which is the overwhelming majority
of the the state legislature, need a refresher course
on how babies are made and a woman's menstrual cycle,
because you usually find out that you're pregnant
after you've missed at least one period,
which is four weeks.
And usually, because some women
have a spotty menstrual cycle,
they're not checking to see whether they're pregnant
after they miss one period.
That was the case with me.
And when I was eight weeks, I did a pregnancy test
and I found out joyfully that I was pregnant
with our youngest child.
The average woman in Florida who gets an abortion,
it's really about 15-16 weeks.
You have 90, only about 4% of abortions
occur after the 15 week ban.
Most happen after six weeks and six days.
So essentially what you're doing
is you're gonna adopt a near total abortion ban
before most women even know they're pregnant.
That's outrageous.
And it's also overwhelmingly opposed by Floridians
and by Republicans in this state.
>>I wanna turn to more of a national/international issue
with regard to Ukraine and the fact
that Governor DeSantis recently said that
he does not view Ukraine and the war, again with Russia,
between Ukraine and Russia,
as being part of the US vital interest,
suggesting that he would not be as supportive
of Ukraine going forward
even though he had in the past,
when he was a member of Congress had supported Ukraine.
What's your reaction to the Governor
changing his position now on this?
>>Well, I think Ron DeSantis should focus more on
taking care of the people of Florida
than on answering questions
that have nothing to do with his role as governor.
I know that he is doing everything he can
to copycat Donald Trump.
In this instance, to suggest that Russia's invasion
of Ukraine is nothing more than a territorial dispute
is analogous to if Mexico decided to start to...
that invaded Texas and would start suggesting
that Texas was once part of Mexico
so it's perfectly within their right to combat us for it.
It's dangerous.
It puts Europe in danger.
It puts democracy across the globe in danger.
It allows for...
If we roll back our involvement in making sure
that Ukraine can remain the sovereign democracy
that they are, then that gives a green light
to China to go after Taiwan.
It empowers Putin.
And this is a state that has people from Venezuela
and Cuba who have fled Putin's propped up tyrants.
And it's insulting to thousands of people
who fled authoritarian regimes here in Florida.
What Republicans need to be doing
is making sure that they stop engaging in these culture wars
and start ensuring that they can make sure
we strengthen our public education system,
that we stop threatening social security and Medicare
which Republicans continue to do,
that we don't waste time on made up, woke out ideology
and threatening and taking away people's rights.
Stop banning books which Ron DeSantis has done.
Stop banning speech and ensure that we can focus
on the bread and butter kitchen table issues
that families want the government to focus on.
>>You know, during the Trump administration
they instituted a family detention policy
for folks coming across the border.
There is speculation talk, but serious talk apparently,
that the Biden administration is planning on
re-instituting some version or some form
of the family detention policy for migrants.
Would you advise the President not to go down that path?
>>What the President has been trying to do
is make sure that we have a humane
and orderly immigration process.
The best way to solve that, Jim,
is for Republicans to come to the table
and sit down and finalize comprehensive immigration reform.
That is the best way to stop immigrants
coming to the border, as well as making sure
as President Biden's budgets have done,
providing resources to countries like Honduras and Guatemala
and other nations in Latin America to prop up
and strengthen the economies and governments there
so that they don't feel the need to flee their country
and flee persecution and that violence is reduced there.
We are successful in being able to provide assistance
to countries when we do that.
And that's incredibly important.
Republicans need to stop demonizing immigrants.
That's the bottom line.
Ron DeSantis needs to stop demonizing immigrants.
He's been using the state law
as a weapon against our immigrants.
And it's baffling to me because we have so many immigrants
who have come to this state and made this state
the strong and vibrant state that it is today.
And Ron DeSantis seems to wanna treat them
like they're the enemy.
>>Yeah, I wanna ask it again though.
Do you believe that while working on
those other things that you talked about,
that family detention is a viable option
for the Biden administration to pursue,
to re-institute that Trump policy of family detention?
>>I don't think Joe Biden
is gonna reinstate family detention.
No, I don't think that would be a good idea.
But more importantly, what President Biden
has successfully done is instituted parole programs
that have allowed Venezuelans,
have allowed Haitians, have allowed Ukrainians
to come lawfully into the country,
fleeing persecution, be able to be sponsored
by an individual here in the United States.
And that has reduced immigration pressure at our border
as a result by up to 90% in some cases.
And we need to make sure that helping people
who are simply fleeing persecution and trying to make
a better way of life for themselves and their families,
that there is a lawful and or continues to be a lawful
and orderly way to apply for asylum
and come to this country.
One thing, Jim, that I wanna underscore though
is that again, Republicans,
especially Ron DeSantis are demonizing immigrants,
suggesting that we have fentanyl streaming across the border
that is specifically being brought by immigrants.
That is completely untrue.
Most fentanyl is intercepted at our ports of entry.
It is overwhelmingly being brought by Americans.
The prosecutions of fentanyl smuggling cases
have been about 86% of Americans.
So, again, demonizing immigrants
and lying about who is driving this problem is disgusting.
>>When we come back, we take a closer look
at a plan by the Florida legislature
that could limit lawsuits against property owners
who endanger the lives of their tenants.
Stay with us.