Florida Republican Rep. María Elvira Salazar sparked a furious backlash after releasing a campaign ad accusing President Donald Trump of taking immigration enforcement “too far.” The Florida congresswoman warned Trump that Hispanic voters who supported him in 2024 now feel “betrayed” by his administration. She urged the president to provide millions of illegal immigrants with what she called a “dignified life” in the United States. The ad quickly drew accusations that Salazar was abandoning the immigration platform Trump openly campaigned on.
Salazar represents Florida’s 27th Congressional District, which includes portions of Miami and has a large Hispanic population. She endorsed Trump in 2024 and encouraged Hispanic voters to return him to the White House after four years of record illegal border crossings under former President Joe Biden. Trump endorsed Salazar’s reelection campaign earlier this year, praising her work on border security and other Republican priorities. Her new ad publicly challenges the president on one of the defining policies of his second term.
“Mr. President, some of your immigration enforcement efforts have gone too far,” Salazar said at the beginning of the ad. She cited detention figures that she used to argue that federal immigration authorities are targeting too many illegal immigrants without criminal histories. “In July, 50% of the 50,000 people that were detained had no criminal record,” she claimed.
“Be careful what your advisors are telling you about immigration policy,” Salazar continued, according to Trending Politics. “The same Hispanics who helped you get to the White House in 2024 feel betrayed today.” Her warning came as the Trump administration continued the immigration crackdown that the president repeatedly promised during the 2024 campaign.
Salazar compared the immigration issue to two of the most consequential political struggles in American history. “You can be for immigration what [Abraham] Lincoln was for slavery and [Ronald] Reagan was for communism,” she told Trump. Salazar insisted that she was not calling for amnesty, but she immediately advocated allowing illegal immigrants already living in the country to remain under a new legal arrangement. “I’m talking about giving them a dignified life in this promised land,” she said.
The congresswoman has promoted that approach through the DIGNITY Act, legislation that combines additional border enforcement with legal status for qualifying illegal immigrants. The proposal would require nationwide E-Verify, increase penalties for human smugglers, expand border barriers and create a seven-year program for illegal immigrants who entered the United States before December 31, 2020. Participants would be required to pass a criminal background check, pay back taxes, obey federal and state laws and pay $7,000 in restitution. Republican critics have described the legal-status program as amnesty despite Salazar’s rejection of that label.
Watch Salazar deliver her message to Trump here:
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The reaction from prominent Trump supporters was immediate. “Time to replace her with a REAL conservative,” conservative commentator Gunther Eagleman wrote after the ad appeared. The popular End Wokeness account highlighted Salazar’s “promised land” language and wrote, “This is a GOP Congresswoman, saying that the US is a ‘Promised Land’ for millions of illegals living here.”
Conservative commentator Nick Sortor issued an even harsher response and called on Trump to withdraw his endorsement. “TOTAL BS. President Trump should REVOKE his endorsement of this traitor,” Sortor wrote. “Hispanic American citizens voted to REMOVE ILLEGALS who have invaded their communities. And that’s exactly what’s happening—albeit at a slower pace than I’d like to see.” Trump hadn’t publicly responded to Salazar’s ad as of Friday morning.
Featured image credit: LogCabinRepublicanFL, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons