I Feel So Bad for Florida, It Can’t Ban the Chinese From Buying Florida’s Land

Who Among us will outbid the communists from buying American land?

For much of my adult life, the GOP has cast itself as a champion of free markets. The GOP has told us over and over again that the government produces nothing useful, and that the government should not have any control over the free market of America. But the GOP didn’t seem to mind passing a law that would prohibit Chinese citizens from buying land in Florida in 2023.

Here is a summary of the law in question:

CS/CS/SB 264: Interests of Foreign Countries

Interests of Foreign Countries; Prohibiting governmental entities from knowingly entering into certain contracts; authorizing the Attorney General to bring a civil action; providing penalties; requiring government entities to require an affidavit from applicants before providing any economic incentive; prohibiting foreign principals from purchasing agricultural land, or having more than a de minimus indirect interest in such land, and certain real property in this state, respectively; authorizing foreign principals to continue to own or hold such land or property under certain circumstances, etc. [emphasis mine]

Which foreign interests are they talking about?

“Foreign country of concern” means the People’s Republic of China, the Russian Federation, the Islamic Republic of Iran, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, the Republic of Cuba, the Venezuelan regime of Nicolás Maduro, or the Syrian Arab Republic, including any agency of or any other entity of significant control of such foreign country of concern.

Whatever you do, if you’re from one of those bad countries and want to live in a better country like America, don’t move to Florida.

After that law passed, litigation ensued. From Politico on 2/2/24, “Federal appeals court narrowly blocks controversial Florida law barring Chinese land ownership”:

Gov. Ron DeSantis championed the law last year while on the presidential campaign trail and criticized the administration of President Joe Biden for siding with plaintiffs in the case. DeSantis, who signed the bill, FL SB264 (23R), into law in May but is not a defendant in the case, tweeted in July that while the Biden administration “sides with Communist China, I side with the American people.”

Just a little bit of nuance here. The article says this:

The law specifically prohibits those from China who are “domiciled” there and are not “lawful” U.S. residents from buying or owning more than a single parcel of two acres. The land may not be within five miles of a military installation. Several other states, including Texas and Louisiana, weighed similar measures last year.

The summary of the law written by the Florida Senate says it is directed at “governmental entities” not ordinary people. Maybe the law is being enforced against two citizens of China because in order to be a citizen, they must be a member of the Communist Party of China.

The GOP of Florida says that the threat is one of Chinese citizens buying American land. Huh. I remember how Japanese citizens were buying prime cuts of land in Hawaii and California in the 90s and the 00s. I don’t recall anyone passing any laws to stop them from buying American land. Oh, wait. The Japanese are capitalists.

But still, there is one thing I don’t understand. The law prohibits communist Chinese Citizens from buying American land. Communists as in communism. You know, that inferior system that never really works in the end?

So what Ron DeSantis is saying is that Americans living in Florida simply lack the money to outbid the Chinese to buy land in Florida. But he doesn’t say that part out loud. He wants us to look at China as if China is the problem. He doesn’t want anyone to notice that there aren’t enough Americans with enough money to outbid Chinese citizens from a communist country, in a sale of land in Florida.

Is that what Ron DeSantis really means?

Now the Politico article waxes eloquently about rights secured under the 14th Amendment of the Constitution, and rightfully so. But so far, I’ve never really seen anyone wonder aloud why Americans can’t outbid communists on a sale of land in Florida. That part of the story must be really, really irksome to the bald eagle Republicans of Florida.

I guess Republicans don’t want to talk about the part of the story where they spent the last 43 years busting union power across America. Maybe they really don’t want to talk about how they thrust American workers into competition with Chinese workers during that time, either. And God knows they don’t want to talk about how their efforts to de-industrialize and turn America into a haven for bankers precipitated the collapse of the housing market in 2008.

And please don’t ask them about how they bailed out the banks instead of American homeowners during the Great Recession. Not during an election year. They really don’t want to talk about how the economy is rigged and how they did the rigging. If we had that conversation, we’d have to talk about an economy that doesn’t leave Americans with enough money to outbid those poor, backward communist Chinese citizens who want to buy land in America.

I mean, how did they get their hands on so much money that they could travel here, stay awhile, and buy American real estate? Isn’t the communist way of doing things designed to keep everyone dirt poor? Jack Ma is a beggar compared to Elon Musk, right? Wait. Elon Musk might have to disgorge a shit-ton of money after the latest court ruling against his $56 billion pay package runs it’s course.

Who was that guy who got so rich on Amazon? I can’t even remember his name. Larry something, right? It was Jeff Bezos. I don’t think he has as much of a problem with contracts as Musk does. But I do find it interesting that no billionaires stepped up to outbid a Chinese buyer and prevent them from buying a prime cut of land in Florida. That would be a free market response to the “scourge of communism”, wouldn’t it?

Republicans thought of passing a law first before enlisting the help of the “hidden hand” of capitalism to stop the sale of land to the Chinese. They’re passing laws about gay people, transgender people, women who can’t afford to have babies, and people who won’t pray like they do. Is that how the free market works? Just pass a law and make people behave?

The Chinese can just do what wealthy Americans do. Create a corporation that lives in a file cabinet in the Cayman Islands. Then let that “person” buy the land that Chinese people are prohibited from buying. And if they really want to, they can create multiple shell companies with complex structures and relationships that would take years to unravel to hide the true owner of the land. You know, a corporate veil. With the right connections, no one will ever know the Chinese own any American land.

The “Interests of Foreign Countries Act” could have been easily subverted by anyone with enough money and incentive to do it. America built the tools the Chinese can use to evade the law and still get what they want.

I think it’s kind of flattering that citizens of the 2nd largest economy in the world, a communist country, would want to buy American land. And if I had wanted to stop sales of American land to communists, I would have built a middle class with enough money to outbid the communists instead of passing a pithy little law to stop them.

Write on.