Work can begin next week to rename a one-mile stretch of roadway alongside Florida International University after slain conservative activist Charlie Kirk under legislation Gov. Ron DeSantis just approved.

DeSantis signed HB 33 by Miami Rep. Juan Porras, which renames a portion of Southwest 107th Avenue in west Miami-Dade County between Coral Way and Tamiami Trail as “Charlie Kirk Memorial Avenue.”

The measure, which passed on party-line votes in the House and Senate, where Doral Sen. Ana Maria Rodriguez carried a companion bill, also authorizes renaming part of Commercial Boulevard in Broward County as “President Donald J. Trump Boulevard,” effectuating a resolution that Lauderdale-by-the-Sea narrowly passed in October.

Porras, who called Kirk a friend, said the location of the street renaming is appropriate, since he helped found Florida’s first Kirk-run Turning Point USA chapter at FIU back in 2015.

Porras noted in Committee that the city of Sweetwater had issued a resolution supporting HB 33, though the roadway in question isn’t in Sweetwater’s bounds.

Opponents of the measure argued that Kirk, who owned a vacation home in Longboat Key in Sarasota County, had little tangible connections to Florida or Miami-Dade. They also raised issues with Kirk’s rhetoric, including questions he raised about the qualifications of Black pilots, references to “prowling Blacks” targeting White people in urban areas and his perpetuation of the “great replacement theory.”

During the bill’s last legislative committee stop Feb. 10, St. Petersburg Democratic Rep. Michele Rayner quoted Kirk calling Martin Luther King Jr. “awful” and George Floyd a “scumbag.” She recited another statement Kirk made about accomplished Black women like Michelle Obama, Joy Reid, and Ketanji Brown Jackson as having to “steal a White person’s slot” through affirmative action because they “do not have the brain processing power to otherwise be taken really seriously.”

“I have three degrees — earned; nobody gave them to me — and I’m a Black woman. You want me and my colleagues to sit up here and swallow rage and be forced to have a debate on a bill like this, to name a street after someone who doesn’t even live in Florida, who was not a Florida citizen, because he’s your friend?” she said.

“I have a lot of friends I would like to … have bills for. I don’t do that because it’s inappropriate, it’s unprofessional and it’s disgusting.”

Porras said Kirk did not discriminate against people based on any demographic characteristic and pointed out that the late activist had built or contributed to several minority-focused movements, including BLEXIT and the Young Black Leadership Summit, that have benefited “tens of thousands of African Americans.”

During debate on the House floor in February, Miami Democratic Rep. Ashley Gantt called Kirk “mediocre and racist.” She then contended, incorrectly, that Kirk “was not assassinated” but instead suffered “a death by gun violence.”

Kirk was shot and killed by a lone sniper on a Utah university campus Sept. 10, 2025. Gantt’s comments inspired a Fox News headline.

A House staff analysis of the legislation estimates the total cost of implementing the bill to be $4,800 overall — $1,200 per sign, for two signs per designation.

Miami-Dade’s street renaming for Kirk follows similar rechristenings of Country Road in Hernando County, Field Road in Lake County, 51st Street in Manatee County and Country Road in Walton County.

A Senate analysis also noted that the designations are honorary and not full street-name replacements, meaning local street signs, addresses and information for 911 systems won’t need to be changed.

HB 33 goes into effect July 1.