Freshman Florida Republican state Senator Ileana Garcia is facing calls for resignation after standing on the Senate floor Tuesday morning and declaring her support for the dangerous and possibly unconstitutional “Don’t Say Gay” bill by falsely declaring, “Gay is not a permanent thing, LGBT is not a permanent thing.”
Senator Garcia, a former Trump campaign and administration official who won her seat by just 34 votes, is grossly ill-informed, according to every major medical and psychological organization, and according to the vast majority of LGBTQ people.
Garcia also misgendered a transgender woman, Equality Florida notes.
The legislation passed at 11:45 AM Tuesday. It is headed to Gov. DeSantis’ desk, where he is expected to sign it into law.
Garcia served as a Deputy Press Secretary at the Department of Homeland Security. Before being given that job she had founded the group Latinas for Trump, and later served as the Trump campaign’s communications director for Latino outreach. Defending her support for Trump in 2016 she said, “He’s like a parent, when parents want to get their point across, they yell. That’s what he’s doing.”
“I’m not an illegal,” she added. “So why would I get upset about what he says about illegals?”
Watch Sen. Garcia’s remarks from Tuesday morning.