DeSantis says he's working to designate CAIR, antifa as terrorist groups

Lawrence Mower, Tampa Bay Times on Apr 6, 2026

By clicking submit, I authorize Arcamax and its affiliates to: (1) use, sell, and share my information for marketing purposes, including cross-context behavioral advertising, as described in our Privacy Policy , (2) add to information that I provide with other information like interests inferred from web page views, or data lawfully obtained from data brokers, such as past purchase or location data, or publicly available data, (3) contact me or enable others to contact me by email or other means with offers for different types of goods and services, and (4) retain my information while I am engaging with marketing messages that I receive and for a reasonable amount of time thereafter. I understand I can opt out at any time through an email that I receive, or by clicking here

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. — Gov. Ron DeSantis signed legislation Monday allowing him to identify and label domestic terrorist organizations — and he said state police were already building cases against several of them.

At a news conference at the University of South Florida, he said police were “working already” to apply the label to the Muslim civil rights organization Council on American-Islamic Relations, or CAIR, and the Muslim Brotherhood, an international Islamist movement.

“You also have antifa that needs to be taken care of,” he said, before also mentioning the Venezuelan cartel Tren de Aragua.

“Expect us to be very zealous and robust in how we approach dealing with these groups,” DeSantis said.

HB 1471, passed by the Legislature last month, allows the Florida Department of Law Enforcement to identify groups as “domestic terrorists,” powers that are typically reserved for the federal government.

Groups would have to be found engaging in “terrorist activity” as defined in state law and pose “an ongoing threat” to security. The governor and Cabinet would have to approve the designation.

The bill provides no new powers to arrest or prosecute such organizations. Instead, it would bar state and local governments from providing public money to them — a response to reports of Islamic schools receiving public vouchers.

The bill would also immediately expel college students found to support terrorist organizations in what critics believe is an attempt to stamp out left-wing and anti-Israel protesters on college campuses. A University of South Florida student who spoke at Monday’s news conference referenced the 2024 pro-Palestinian protests at USF in which 10 people were arrested, mostly for misdemeanors such as trespassing.

DeSantis, whose office first drafted the bill, said Monday he wanted to prevent “one red cent” for “jihad,” or holy war.

“The legislation we’ll sign today is the strongest action Florida has ever taken to protect its people from this influence,” he said.

The move follows last year’s decision by Texas Gov. Greg Abbott to label CAIR a terrorist organization. Texas’ comptroller has used the designation to block voucher funding to Islamic schools that have hosted events organized by the council. Officials with CAIR have said they had nothing to do with some of the schools.

Officials with CAIR-Florida did not respond to a request for comment Monday. A news release said leaders with the organization planned to respond to the “draconian” law during news conferences on Tuesday.

It wasn’t immediately clear how the organization would fit the state’s definition of “terrorist activity,” which requires either an illegal act of violence or a computer hacking crime. Spokespeople for DeSantis did not respond to a question about it. The federal government has not deemed it a terrorist organization.

DeSantis pointed to the 2001 case against the Dallas-based Muslim charity Holy Land Foundation for Relief and Development. Five leaders of the charity were convicted in 2008 of funneling millions of dollars to the Palestinian militant group Hamas, which has been deemed a terrorist organization by the federal government.

During the case, federal prosecutors released a list of unindicted coconspirators that included CAIR.

“Is that something that we want to be a part of?” DeSantis said. “I mean, if there’s a school that is allied with CAIR, should you have any of your money going to things like that? I think not.”

The legislation has been blasted by free speech groups as unconstitutional. DeSantis said he expected to be sued over it. A federal judge last month temporarily blocked an executive order by DeSantis naming CAIR as a terrorist organization on free speech grounds.

“They’ll sue us, like they do on everything, and we’ll win on appeal,” DeSantis said.

The legislation also stops courts from considering religious codes, including Islamic Sharia law, in legal cases. Republican lawmakers said Sharia law sometimes comes up in contract and family disputes.

Attorney General James Uthmeier said last week that he won’t enforce any state law that prohibits religious schools from accessing public funds.

When asked Monday whether he believed that Islamic schools should be allowed to receive voucher money, attorney general spokesperson Jeremy Redfern didn’t say. Instead, he sent an October X post by Uthmeier in which he responds to a viral video of an Islamic school principal from Tampa discussing receiving Florida voucher money.

“The use of taxpayer-funded school vouchers to promote Sharia law likely contravenes Florida law and undermines our national security,” Uthmeier wrote in the post.

_____