11th Circuit rejects challenge to Florida limits on Chinese immigrants buying property

(CN) — An 11th Circuit panel shot down a challenge Tuesday to a Florida law that bans many immigrants from China and other foreign countries from purchasing homes in vast portions of the state.

Four Chinese immigrants who live, work, study and raise families in Florida — but claimed they were prohibited under Senate Bill 264 from buying a house — brought the suit. Multi-Choice Realty, a local real estate firm that says the law harms its business, is also a plaintiff.

But in a split ruling, the circuit judges held that none of the plaintiffs has standing to challenge the law’s purchase restriction because none of them has shown they suffered an imminent injury.

The majority wrote that the purchase restriction does not actually prevent any of them from purchasing property because they are all domiciled in Florida, not China.

Under Florida law, a person is domiciled in the state if they live “at a place” in Florida, and it does not require an intent to remain permanently to establish domicile.

“This is true even if the person does not have permanent immigration status,” U.S. Circuit Judge Robert Luck wrote in the opinion.

“As with anyone else, when a person without permanent immigration status is present in Florida and forms the intent to make Florida her permanent or indefinite home, she’s acquired domicile in Florida,” the Donald Trump appointee added.

The ruling also affirmed the denial of their request to block the law’s requirement that persons who are domiciled in China, and who are not citizens or lawful permanent residents, register real property they already own and sign an affidavit swearing they have complied with the law.

The majority determined that this requirement does not apply to the plaintiffs because all of them owned a property interest in a home before the provision took effect on July 1, 2023.

While the judges acknowledged the plaintiffs’ concerns over their future ability to purchase Florida property, they failed to establish an imminent injury because none of them showed evidence of specific plans to purchase other properties in the state.

Three of the individual plaintiffs — Yongxin Liu, Zhiming Xu and Yifan Shen — have lived in Florida for years under work visas and have already purchased at least one property. One of the plaintiffs, Xinxi Wang, is at least arguably domiciled in China, the judges wrote, because she has only a temporary student visa and, unlike the other plaintiffs, has not expressed an intention to remain indefinitely in Florida.

The purchase restriction doesn’t impair Wang’s home ownership because it was purchased before the law took effect. However, the judges found she is likely subject to the registration requirement as it is located in Miami within 10 miles of a military installation or critical infrastructure facility.

Still, the judges agreed with the lower court’s denial of the plaintiffs’ preliminary injunction motion because they failed to show a substantial likelihood of success on their claims that Chinese domicile and Chinese national origin are the same thing and that the registration requirement is therefore discriminatory.

As for the real estate brokerage, Multi-Choice, the majority was also not persuaded by its claims that it will lose existing and potential customers from buying Florida property because it failed to specify any harmed clients.

Florida’s Republican Governor Ron DeSantis signed SB 264 into law in 2023, restricting land purchases by immigrants from “foreign countries of concern,” including China, Cuba, Venezuela, Iran, North Korea, Russia and Syria, on or within 10 miles of any military installation or critical infrastructure facility in the state.

The law specifically restricts people who are domiciled in China or who are not citizens or lawful permanent residents from owning any real property in Florida, regardless of location. The sole exception is that people with a valid non-tourist visa or who have been granted asylum can purchase one residential property, but only if it is less than two acres and not within five miles of a military installation.

In their suit, the plaintiffs argued the law violated the Fair Housing Act and Equal Protection Clause because the purchase restriction, registration and affidavit requirements unconstitutionally discriminated against “Chinese persons” based on “race, ethnicity, color, alienage and national origin.”

U.S. Circuit Judge Barbara Lagoa, a fellow Trump appointee, joined Luck in the decision. Their ruling remands the lower court that denied the plaintiffs’ motion for a preliminary injunction to do so without prejudice as to the purchase restriction, meaning it can be tried again in the future.

But U.S. Circuit Judge Charles Wilson wrote separately to express his dissent with the majority’s “dubious equal protection and preemption analyses.”

The Bill Clinton appointee criticized the lack of scrutiny regarding states’ generalizations about their own “power” and the need for “safety” from outsiders to support discriminatory policies and classifications based on where someone is from.

He added that in his view, the plaintiffs would have likely succeeded on their federal preemption claim because Florida’s law intrudes on federal authority.

“If every state enacted its own restrictions on foreign property investment, they would weaken the President’s ability to speak to foreign nations on behalf of the United States,” Wilson wrote.

Attorneys representing the parties did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

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