Nadene Goldfoot
Let reader be warned. This is not the usual illegal immigrant story coming out of Texas. Florida's governor has angered the Texas sheriff with a different set of facts. Read on:
Ron DeSantis born September 14, 1978 born in Jacksonville, Florida , former Navy Seal, Little League player, graduate from Yale and Harvard Law School, is the governor of Florida. He is of Italian descent from his great grandparents.From NPR we learn that "Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis is defending his decision to send Venezuelan migrants to Martha's Vineyard last week, saying outrage over the flights was misplaced.
Speaking Monday on Sean Hannity's show on Fox News hours after the sheriff of Bexar County, Texas, announced a criminal investigation into the flights, DeSantis said, "It's really frustrating. Millions of people since Biden's been president, illegally coming across the southern border. Did they freak out about that? No.
"You've had migrants die in the Rio Grande — you had 50 die in Texas in a trailer because they were being neglected. Was there a freakout about that? No, there wasn't," DeSantis said.
His office released a statement Tuesday morning backing the decision to send the migrants, who had been at a center in Bexar County, where San Antonio is located, to Martha's Vineyard:
The question is, did DeSantis use Florida funds to send Texas immigrants to Martha's Vineyard, one of the most exclusive residential districts in our 50 states?
"The Bexar County Sheriff's Office has opened an investigation into the migrants that were lured from the Migrant Resource Center, located in Bexar County, TX, and flown to Florida, where they were ultimately were left to fend for themselves in Martha's Vineyard, MA" who have no migrant center.
"What we understand is that a Venezuelan migrant was paid a bird-dog fee to recruit 50 migrants who were then lured — and I will use the word 'lured' under false pretenses — to staying in a hotel for a few days, then taken to an airplane where they were flown to Florida and then Martha's Vineyard under false pretenses of being offered jobs," Salazar said. "For what we can gather,this was a little more than a photo op, and then they were left there."
DeSantis said that everyone on the flights had "signed consent forms to go" and that the migrants were given maps and directions on where to go once they arrived in Martha's Vineyard." This looks like pre-planned political trick to me to make someone look bad by the Florida governor.
Fighting against this move by the Florida governor is the Texas sheriff. "Salazar, who expressed his anger over the incident during his news conference, and what he called the false promises that brought the migrants onto the plane.
"What infuriates me the most is what we have 48 people here legally (a change in Texas and Florida history)— they have every right to be here and they were preyed upon," Salazar said. "Lured with promises of a better life and with the knowledge they would cling to anything that was offered for a better life and were exploited and hoodwinked to make the trip to Florida for what I believe was political posturing."
DeSantis uses the excuse" saying that Florida lawmakers gave him $12 million for such transports." "As part of this year's roughly $109.9 billion state budget – which had bipartisan support – the legislature allocated $12 million "to facilitate the transport of unauthorized aliens out of Florida." ""We're going to spend every penny of that," DeSantis said at Friday's press conference. Public records show the state paid a private contractor, Vertol Systems Inc., an aircraft solutions provider, $615,000 to transport the migrants to Martha's Vineyard. That's $12,300 per migrant.
"DeSantis said migrants were identified in Texas as wanting to relocate to Florida before they signed release forms to go to Massachusetts. If releases were signed, it's unclear whether it was true consent."
"Yet the transports, which triggered widespread outrage from Democrats and launched an investigation by a Democratic sheriff in Texas, sparked ongoing questions about whether DeSantis had carried out the program as the Republican-controlled Legislature intended." This looks like another Democrat-Republican election fight.
"It appears that some of these individuals may be Venezuelan political refugees fleeing an oppressive regime who are not unlawfully present in the United States.” In other words, they are here legally.
The pair also said it’s “crystal clear” that DeSantis used the funds in a way not permitted by the state Legislature.
While complicated, questions over how DeSantis used the allocated $12 million gets to the heart of possible legal challenges to DeSantis’ migrant transports. Already, Democratic government and election officials, including California Gov. Gavin Newsom and Massachusetts U.S. Attorney Rachael Rollins, have asked the Justice Department to investigate DeSantis over the flights. And on Monday night, Bexar, Tex. County Sheriff Javier Salazar, an elected Democrat, also said he opened an investigation into the Florida GOP governor’s transports, though he didn’t specify exactly what he was looking into.
Florida legislators in March passed a new state budget which included $12 million for the relocation program that came from interest earnings from the $5.8 billion that Congress sent to the state as part of the American Rescue Plan. The budget overall passed overwhelmingly, with only a handful of legislators voting no.
"Lawyers for Civil Rights, which says it represents about 30 of the migrants that were flown to Massachusetts, on Monday distributed copies of a brochure they said was handed to those on the plane. The brochure, which was first reported by the website, Popular Information, talks about benefits that are available for refugees, a classification that the migrants have not obtained."
When DeSantis rolled out his budget recommendations for the 2022 session, he asked legislators for $8 million to pay for the relocation effort — and he also asked for lawmakers to pass a law that would prohibit state and local governments from contracting with companies that transport those who entered the country illegally into Florida.
When he first announced his plan, DeSantis hinted that Martha’s Vineyard would be one the places that the migrants could be transported.
"A study by the Martha's Vineyard Commission found that the cost of living on the island is 60 percent higher than the national average, and housing prices are 96 percent higher. A study of housing needs by the Commission found that the average weekly wage on Martha's Vineyard was "71 percent of the state average, the median home price was 54 percent above the state's and the median rent exceeded the state's by 17 percent," all leading to a stark example of severe income inequalities between year-round residents and their seasonal counterparts." It's basically a summertime resort.
HIALEAH, Fla. — Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis didn't have a Republican challenger in Tuesday's primary election, but he still hit the campaign trail to rally for votes for the November general election.
"By you coming out in full force this November, we will send a message to this man in the White House that we are fighting back against his destructive policies, and Florida will be the vanguard of freedom in this country," DeSanris said during a "Keep Florida Free" rally in Hialeah.
Massachusetts Republican former state representative Geoff Diehl and Democratic state attorney general Maura Healey are seeking to succeed incumbent Republican governor Charlie Baker, who is not seeking re-election after two terms. "Washington lawmakers need to fix America's "screwed up" immigration system, Baker said." On Friday, the migrants were voluntarily moved to Joint Base Cape Cod, a military base in Sandwich with a Massachusetts Emergency Management Agency-designated emergency shelter. The Executive Office of Public Safety and Security tweeted a video of JBCC Sunday, showing bunk bed-filled bedrooms, a cafeteria, and a recreation room.
Stumping for a gubernatorial candidate at a rally in Kansas this weekend, DeSantis said Massachusetts “deported those people off the island the very next day,” according to NBC10. USA.gov who defines “deportation” as “the formal removal of a foreign national from the U.S.”
Who lives in Martha's vineyard, Massachusetts? Basically, a
lot of well- known people: President John F. Kennedy was there. "The Visit of young Jack Kennedy to Martha’s Vineyard as a young yachtsman in the summer of 1941 hasn’t been forgotten. The adventures of the future President and his brother began before they reached the scene of the regatta at Edgartown.
Martha's Vineyard has also been or is home to a number of artists and musicians, including Albert Alcalay, Evan Dando, Tim "Johnny Vegas" Burton of the Mighty Mighty Bosstones, James Taylor, Carly Simon, Livingston Taylor, Kate Taylor, Alex Taylor, Tom Rush, Rick Marotta, Geoff Muldaur, Maria Muldaur, Willy Mason, Unbusted and Mike Nichols. Historian and author David McCullough is also an island resident, as are author Susan Branch and the young-adult books authors Judy Blume and Norman Bridwell, and crime/political intrigue novelists Richard North Patterson and Linda Fairstein. Late authors Shel Silverstein and William Styron also lived on the Vineyard, as did writer, journalist and teacher John Hersey, poet and novelist Dorothy West and artist Thomas Hart Benton. Various writers have been inspired by the island—including the mystery writer Philip R. Craig who set several novels on the island. On a related note, Martha's Vineyard Poet Laureate, Lee H. McCormack, has written many poems about the island. The Academy Award-winning Patricia Neal owned a home on South Water St in Edgartown, and James Cagney, Lillian Hellman (who is buried in Abel's Hill Cemetery near the site of Belushi's grave), and Katharine Cornell all found the Vineyard an exciting, rewarding place to live. In addition, the famous Life magazine photographer Alfred Eisenstaedt was a fifty-year summer resident of the Vineyard until his death in 1995. These are but some of a few more.
Resource:
https://www.npr.org/2022/09/19/1123975684/texas-sheriff-criminal-investigation-desantis-migrant-flight-marthas-vineyard
https://www.politico.com/news/2022/09/19/desantis-immigrants-marthas-vineyard-venezuela-00057673
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martha%27s_Vineyard
https://www.wptv.com/news/political/elections-local/desantis-in-miami-8-23-22
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