Operation Tidal Wave arrested 10,400 illegal immigrants in eight months and sent 93 deportation flights out of Florida.
Now DeSantis just approved another $90 million to make sure the next wave hits even harder.
While Chuck Schumer holds press conferences demanding Trump stop the deportations, Florida is buying the radios to keep them going.
Florida Has Already Built the Template
On Tuesday, the State Board of Immigration Enforcement – Governor Ron DeSantis, Attorney General James Uthmeier, Chief Financial Officer Blaise Ingoglia, and Agriculture Commissioner Wilton Simpson – voted unanimously to send $90 million to 56 county and city police departments across the state.
The money is heading out the door for radios, body cameras, AI policing systems, X-ray machines, inmate restraint chairs, riot gear, ballistic helmets, and DNA testing equipment.
It also funds the purchase of mobile surveillance towers.
The Polk County Sheriff's Office is getting $8.7 million.
https://twitter.com/AGJamesUthmeier/status/2064438085555749340?s=20
This $8.7 million is specifically for encrypted radio systems – because their current equipment cannot communicate with ICE agents.
That gap was a deliberate failure of the old system.
Sanctuary city policies weren't just political statements.
They were engineering decisions.
Local law enforcement was deliberately kept unable to coordinate with federal agents on immigration arrests.
That ends now.
This Is What the Trump Model Actually Looks Like in Practice
Orange County requested $9 million for 910 portable radios.
Walton County asked for more than $2.5 million for rapid DNA testing.
This means the results would be fast enough to verify immigration status in hours, cut detention time, and free resources for more arrests.
https://twitter.com/zerobarkthirty/status/2064386684590973042?s=20
Collier County is adding two Skywatch mobile surveillance towers for enhanced situational awareness during enforcement operations.
These aren't luxury items.
They're the infrastructure that turns political promises into actual arrests and actual deportations.
Florida's legislature set aside a full $250 million for local agency reimbursements – and this $90 million approval brings total disbursements to $147 million.
That funding model is what every Republican governor in America should be copying.
One State Made Itself the National Standard
Florida's numbers are documented, not hypothetical.
Operation Tidal Wave launched in April 2025 as the largest joint immigration enforcement operation in ICE history – state officers working directly alongside federal agents under 287(g) agreements that had historically been reserved for the federal government alone.
Ten thousand four hundred arrests in eight months.
Ninety-three deportation flights out of the "Deportation Depot" facility in Baker County, carrying nearly 3,000 people.
Combined with other local enforcement efforts, Florida logged close to 20,000 total immigration arrests for 2025.
ICE credited Florida with "setting the standard across the nation" – 325 active 287(g) agreements, a 577% increase since January 20, 2025.
Every sheriff's office, every highway patrol trooper, every relevant agency in all 67 Florida counties now has a direct line to federal deportation operations.
Today's $90 million vote is how you keep that machine running.
Schumer called Florida's enforcement operations "cruel and un-American."
Florida called them 20,000 arrests and counting.
Sources:
- Ana Goñi-Lessan, "Florida Gov. DeSantis, Cabinet green light $90 million for immigration enforcement," News Service of Florida, June 9, 2026.
- "ICE Awards Florida's State and Local Law Enforcement with 287(g) Funds to Defend the Homeland," ICE.gov, September 26, 2025.
- "Governor Ron DeSantis Highlights Success of Florida-Federal Immigration Partnership as Operation Tidal Wave Reaches More Than 10,000 Arrests," Office of the Governor of Florida, January 5, 2026.
- "DeSantis Warns Florida Is 'Not Portland' as State Secures Major Federal Immigration Funding," Fox News, September 2025.
