Both California Gov. Gavin Newsom and California Attorney General Rob Bonta put out statements on over the weekend pronouncing they’d met with a gaggle of migrants who traveled from Texas to New Mexico ahead of being flown to Sacramento.
Bonta prompt that the DeSantis management could also be related to the operation as a result of he mentioned the migrants seemed to have bureaucracy attached to Florida, regardless that he didn’t supply main points at the documentation. The migrants flown ultimate fall by way of the DeSantis management to Martha’s Vineyard got pamphlets detailing the advantages to be had to them in Massachusetts.
“We are investigating the circumstances by which these individuals were brought to California,” Bonta mentioned. “We are also evaluating potential criminal or civil action against those who transported or arranged for the transport of these vulnerable immigrants. While this is still under investigation, we can confirm these individuals were in possession of documentation purporting to be from the government of the state of Florida.”
Eddie Carmona, marketing campaign director at PICO California, a faith-based group organizing team that has been helping the migrants, told The Associated Press that the migrants had already been given court dates for his or her asylum circumstances when an individual representing a non-public contactor approached them out of doors a migrant heart in El Paso, Texas. Carmona informed the AP that “they were lied to and intentionally deceived.”
The Associated Press recognized the migrants as originating from Colombia and Venezuela.
The newest flights may well be regarded as political retaliation towards Newsom, who has been a continuing critic of Florida’s insurance policies. The California governor lately visited New College of Florida in Sarasota, a faculty lately present process a conservative overhaul led by way of DeSantis. At the time, Newsom mentioned the efforts by way of DeSantis to rebrand the varsity had been a part of his efforts of “bullying and intimidating vulnerable communities.”
Newsom additionally lately asked information from DeSantis, the Florida Department of Education and textbook publishers over adjustments made to Okay-12 textbooks that had been asked by way of the Florida training company.
DeSantis is headed to Texas on Tuesday for a three-day six-city fundraising excursion according to a schedule obtained by The Texas Tribune. The governor could also be headed to California later this month, the place he’ll hang a June nineteenth breakfast fundraiser in Sacramento, the Sacramento Bee reported.
DeSantis was once simply one in all a handful of governors or metropolis leaders who have transported migrants. Texas GOP Gov. Greg Abbott has bused hundreds of migrants from his state to Democrat-led towns like Washington, D.C., Chicago and NYC whilst New York Mayor Eric Adams, who has railed towards the loss of assets to be had to take care of an inflow of migrants, has additionally transported migrants out of doors of his metropolis.
Both DeSantis’ management and the Florida Division of Emergency Management — which now oversees the relocation program — didn’t straight away reply to inquiries from POLITICO on Sunday.
DeSantis has been a chronic and vocal critic of the immigration insurance policies of President Joe Biden, and one in all his allies — Florida Attorney General Ashley Moody — has contended in federal courtroom that the Biden management is ignoring federal immigration rules.
During his presidential marketing campaign stops during the last week, DeSantis vowed to reinstitute a few of former President Donald Trump’s immigration insurance policies corresponding to “remain in Mexico” and promised to whole development of a border wall.
“You deserve to have a secure border, you deserve to have the rule of law,” DeSantis mentioned all through a consult with to Iowa proper ahead of he become an authentic candidate for president. “Someone comes across the border stop them and send them back on the other side … Don’t give them a piece of paper and say you come back for a court date in four years. What kind of a deterrence is that?”
Florida’s GOP-controlled Legislature in 2022 first gave DeSantis $12 million to perform the migrant relocation program throughout the Florida Department of Transportation, however authorities shifted regulate to the state Division of Emergency Management. State information prompt that the corporate that operated the primary spherical of flights was once paid $1.56 million.
The emergency control department in early May posted a realize that it meant to award contracts to 3 distributors to paintings at the migrant relocation program. DeSantis additionally signed an immigration invoice ultimate month that incorporated an extra $12 million for this system.
Andrew Atterbury, Lara Korte and Jeremy White contributed to this tale.
