The next federal election is a year and a half away, but the campaign is underway. Businessman and lawyer Keith Gross will be challenging incumbent Republican Senator Rick Scott in the GOP primary. Dozens of residents gathered for a meet and greet at Big Daddy Guns’ Freedom Hall. Gross says one of the biggest issues in Florida is the economy. He also wants to firm up the southern border. “Title 42, that’s really just a band-aid on a bullet hole. We’re about to have tens of thousands of illegal immigrants pouring across our border because of an ingrained policy of disconnecting actions from consequences. There’s no consequence for violating our laws at the border,” said Gross. Gross says his next stop will be at a meet in greet at the gathering cafe in Ocala on Tuesday. GAINESVILLE, Fla. (WCJB)

United States Border Patrol recently announced that about 90,000 migrants flooded across our unsecured southern border during the last 10 days of April. This total includes more than 73,000 migrants Border Patrol encountered and apprehended, and another estimated 17,000 “gotaways” who slipped past our overwhelmed security entirely.  This surge comes as Title 42 is set to expire. Title 42 is a Trump-era policy implemented during the pandemic that allowed immigration officials to quickly turn away migrants who did not meet asylum requirements. A debate has raged over the past several months about whether Title 42 should be allowed to expire, considering the devastating consequences its expiration will have on the historic immigration crisis. But the whole debate is simply a distraction from the root of the problem, which is a fundamental disconnect between actions and consequences, especially regarding America’s laws. Title 42 was intended as a COVID-related emergency use policy to mitigate viral spread. As the federal coronavirus emergency itself is expiring , the Title 42 policy should also expire. Never-ending “emergency” policies endanger American freedom by setting a dangerous precedent for the government to seize control under the guise of an “emergency” with no end in sight. Unfortunately, however, Title 42’s expiration will also worsen the crisis at the border, with immigrants seeing it as a sign to freely enter the country. Tens of thousands of migrants have already amassed at the border, waiting to enter the country as soon as the policy is lifted. Still, perpetuating a policy intended to be temporary, and one that is simply a Band-Aid on a bullet hole, is not a solution. What we need is to enact substantive consequences for breaking America’s laws. Without serious consequences for illegally breaching our nation’s border, there is no incentive to stop doing so. The lack of accountability for breaking our federal immigration laws gives the impression that our southern border is wide open. And for all intents and purposes, it is. Since President Joe Biden took office, illegal immigration has skyrocketed, likely instigated by statements made during his campaign that invited the flood of immigrants. But even as the crisis worsened, the Biden administration failed to enforce our federal immigration laws, instead supporting policies that further encouraged and even allowed illegal immigration. Migrants discovered there were no real consequences for breaking America’s federal immigration laws, and it became simply a numbers game — if you happen to get deported when you cross, you cross again and again until you find yourself settled in America. Just ask four-time-deported Francisco Oropesa , who recently massacred his neighbor’s family after once again entering our country illegally. Another part of the numbers game is the astounding disparity between the number of illegal immigrants and enforcement agents protecting our border. Illegal immigrants pile up at the border, knowing we lack the capacity to handle the sheer volume of immigrants, and also knowing that this increases their chances of getting away with their illegal entry. But even as Border Patrol agents and immigration facilities are being overwhelmed, Biden is being thanked by the Mexican president for his open-border stance. And while border towns are being crushed under the weight of millions of illegal immigrants, Biden is cutting important border security programs that assist agents in monitoring the vast stretches of terrain that agents can no longer feasibly patrol. Biden recently announced the deployment of 1,500 active-duty troops to the southern border ahead of the expected illegal immigration surge following Title 42’s expiration, but this move is nothing more than optics. After inviting, facilitating, then ignoring this ever-worsening illegal immigration crisis, 1,500 troops are meaningless except as a political stunt so Biden can claim he did something. The border has been thoroughly overrun, the system is crumbling beneath the crisis, and the lack of consequences has only empowered those who will perpetuate the disaster by illegally crossing our border following the expiration of Title 42. If Biden were serious about getting a handle on the border crisis, he would propose a permanent policy in the same vein as Title 42. The benefit of this temporary policy was that it helped expedite claims for asylum, many of which were illegitimate. Many illegal immigrants claim to seek asylum from the violence and economic devastation of their home nations. While this is a tragedy worthy of our concern, many of these illegal immigrants do not qualify for asylum, as our laws do not provide relief for economic or general violence concerns alone. Our effort to have open hearts has resulted in open borders, and we simply cannot afford that. Congress also has an important role to play. Thorough reform must be done through the legislature so that border security isn’t left to the whims of an executive branch that has shown a reckless disregard for the established laws of our land. Congress has neglected its duty for years. Don’t let their outcry over the end of Title 42 fool you. There is a steep social cost for disregarding our federal laws and failing to secure our border. This crisis has resulted in a range of issues, including unprecedented drug and human trafficking crises and the general degradation of the American justice system. Law-abiding American citizens are the ones who end up shouldering that cost. Keith Gross is a conservative businessman and attorney from Panama City, Florida. He is the executive director of Advancing Florida, an organization founded to advocate freedom the Florida way.

Senatorial candidate Keith Gross says RIck Scott 'has a lot of baggage.'

Florida Republican Senator Rick Scott will face a challenge in the GOP Primary for his seat in Washington. Businessman and lawyer Keith Gross is running against him. Keith joins Holly Gregory in-studio to talk about his campaign. Disney takes legal action against Governor Ron DeSantis.  Democrats push back as Republicans pave the way for DeSantis to run for President without resigning as Governor. President Joe Biden says he wants to finish the job, making it officials that he's running for reelection. Former President Donald Trump might not be taking part in any upcoming debates.

Florida Republican Senator Rick Scott will face a challenge in the GOP Primary for his seat in Washington. Businessman and lawyer Keith Gross is running against him. Keith joins Holly Gregory in-studio to talk about his campaign. Disney takes legal action against Governor Ron DeSantis. Democrats push back as Republicans pave the way for DeSantis to run for President without resigning as Governor. President Joe Biden says he wants to finish the job, making it officials that he's running for reelection. Former President Donald Trump might not be taking part in any upcoming debates.

The Panama City native has explored a run for months. Melbourne lawyer Keith Gross announced he’s running for U.S. Senate, setting up a Republican Primary with U.S. Sen. Rick Scott. Gross has explored a run for months . Now he has formally launched his campaign with a video on YouTube and a live website . “The people we’re supposed to trust in Washington have forgotten us, the people that sent them there,” Gross said in his launch video. “Our nation is in desperate need of real leadership because, at the end of the day, we all want the same thing: freedom.” While Gross makes no mention of the incumbent, Scott has already announced he will seek re-election to the Senate for a second term. Gross also seems to take a veiled swipe at Scott by describing himself as “someone that isn’t getting rich by riding fraud and corruption.” That’s an apparent allusion to a $1.7-billion Medicaid fraud settlement by Columbia/HCA to the federal government. The hospital chain agreed to pay that settlement as it pushed Scott out as CEO. The incident has fueled repeated attacks on Scott since his first run for Florida Governor in 2010. But like Scott, Gross enters a race for statewide office with a business resume, not a political record. The head of Gross Law Group in Melbourne, the lawyer has worked both as in-house counsel for businesses and as an Assistant State Attorney. When he first formed a nonprofit exploring his candidacy, Gross stressed his background as a “very wealthy businessman, worth millions.” Another similarity, Gross’ bio leans heavily on his background as a self-made man raised by a single mother. His campaign stresses a conservative political ideology, with his launch video recounting childhood memories of watching former President Ronald Reagan give a famous speech at the Berlin Wall. He said that speech first taught him the meaning of freedom. He also calls freedom “the Florida way,” borrowing rhetoric from Gov. Ron DeSantis, a frequent intra-party rival of Scott. While Gross’ website doesn’t attack Scott, the site for his exploratory organization does. An op-ed penned by Gross appears on the Advancing Florida website and attacks Scott’s position on re-evaluating Social Security. “This isn’t a handout, it’s a return on our investment. Social Security is a promise made to workers by our government and our nation must keep its promises,” Gross wrote in February. “Rick Scott is untrustworthy and I’m not surprised that he is trying to sunset Social Security because this is exactly what you should expect from someone with his history.” That’s an attack similar to criticisms from Democrats employed when Scott released his Rescue America plan for Senate Republicans in the Midterms. That called for all federal programs to sunset every five years to be reviewed by Congress. After critics slammed that as an attack on Medicare and Social Security, Scott said he supported continuing both programs.

Every action and inaction by President Joe Biden sends a message. Unfortunately, it’s often the wrong message, leading to disastrous consequences. His seeming disinterest in and abject failure to address the devastating southern border immigration crisis, for example, have wreaked havoc on our country and signaled to the rest of the world that we can’t be bothered to protect our own sovereignty. This crisis began when, during his presidential campaign, Biden promoted illegal immigration by telling foreigners that “you should come” while criticizing restrictions and promising to eliminate deterrents such as the border wall. Caravans of immigrants wearing Biden T-shirts headed to our border immediately, as though they had been personally invited by him. Two years later and the caravans are still arriving. Just this month, a crowd of more than 1,000 migrants aggressively rushed an El Paso entry point to enter our country forcibly. Biden ended his second year in office with record -high monthly southern border encounters: 251,487 immigrants. And those are just the recorded encounters. U.S. border agents report an estimated 1.2 million “ gotaways ,” or illegal immigrants who entirely thwart our immigration processes, since Biden took office. Meanwhile, Biden has removed eight of the 12 surveillance blimps used to monitor parts of the border that cannot feasibly be patrolled. One can’t help but wonder how many terror watchlisters were among the 1.2 million “gotaways,” especially considering that 98 were arrested at the southern border during fiscal 2022 alone. Biden’s indifference toward enforcing our federal immigration laws sends the message that America’s laws don’t matter. Cartels and criminals are taking full advantage, with human and drug trafficking hitting record highs. Millions of immigrants illegally enter our nation under the misguided assumption that illegal immigration is no longer a problem. They believe that if they can just get here, they will become Americans and enjoy all the rights, privileges, and opportunities this great nation has to offer. This sets them up for failure when they find that they remain illegal immigrants without those rights, privileges, and opportunities afforded to American citizens. The effects this crisis has on American industry cannot be overstated. Illegal immigrants must continually subvert American laws in order to remain in the country. Sometimes they create their own employment opportunities by forming illegal contracting companies that thwart the legal employment requirements that citizens must follow, including taxes, employee rights, and workplace standards. American businesses are subsequently undercut and outbid by these illegal operations. As an assistant state attorney with the Florida prosecutor’s office, I have also seen firsthand the damaging effects of illegal immigration on our justice system. In Florida, noncitizens are ineligible for a driver’s license, so they must drive without a license or insurance. If they are arrested, county governments have a difficult time determining the best course of action since the federal government refuses to pick up most detained illegal immigrants. With jails already near capacity, Florida taxpayers cannot afford to expand them to hold noncitizen violators of state laws. The effect is that there is now a lesser standard of justice for illegal immigrants. According to 2020 research by the Cato Institute, for example, Texas’s criminal conviction rate of illegal immigrants is almost 50% lower than for native-born Americans — and that was before Biden’s illegal immigration crisis. Crimes committed by illegal immigrants have since surged . America has long been a land of freedom and opportunity for all, and legal immigration is a major contributing factor to the success of our melting-pot nation. But the blatant America Last messaging and damaging priorities of the Biden administration cheapen those values that make our nation great. We must close our border and put an end to the illegal immigration crisis to safeguard American greatness for all who legally seek it. Congress can and should change immigration law if necessary, but in the meantime, Americans should not be forced to sit by and watch their president refuse to honor his constitutional obligation to enforce our laws.

Recently ranked number one in the country for parental empowerment in education, Florida is showing the nation what it means to return the power to the people.