#migrant flights by desantis

[ausetkmt]

TALLAHASSEE, FL — Authorities in two states are threatening Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis with criminal charges after dozens of migrants were flown from Texas to California this week and to Massachusetts in September 2022.

In California, authorities were investigating whether DeSantis was behind a flight that picked up asylum-seekers on the Texas border and flew them — apparently without their knowledge — to California's capital of Sacramento.

The development coincided with confirmation from the Bexar County Sheriff's Office in Texas that criminal charges were recommended against DeSantis in connection to an incident where 49 asylum seekers were flown from Texas to Martha's Vineyard as part of DeSantis' migrant relocation program.

In California, about 20 people aged 21 to 30 were flown by private jet to Sacramento on Monday, state Attorney General Rob Bonta said. It was the second such flight in four days.

Sacramento Mayor Darrell Steinberg and faith-based groups who have been assisting the migrants scheduled a news conference for Tuesday morning.

Meanwhile, California Gov. Gavin Newsom lashed out at DeSantis on Twitter, calling him a "small, pathetic man" and suggesting his state could pursue kidnapping charges.

"@RonDeSantis, you small, pathetic man," Newsom tweeted. "This isn't Martha's Vineyard. Kidnapping charges?"

With the tweet, Newsom included a section of the California penal code on kidnapping charges that reads, "(d) Every person who, being out of this state, abducts or takes by force or fraud any person contrary to the law of the place where that act is committed and brings, sends, or conveys that person within the limits of this state, and is afterwards found within the limits thereof, is guilty of kidnapping."

DeSantis, who is seeking the Republican nomination to run for president, has been a fierce critic of federal immigration policy under President Joe Biden and has heavily publicized Florida's role in past instances in which migrants were transported to Democratic-led states.

DeSantis and other Florida officials have remained mum, as they initially were last year when they flew 49 Venezuelan migrants to the upscale Massachusetts island of Martha's Vineyard, luring them onto private jets from a shelter in San Antonio.

In a statement to the Miami Herald this week, the Bexar County Sheriff's Office in Texas confirmed that criminal charges were recommended in connection with the Martha's Vineyard case.

The case was then passed to the Bexar County District Attorney, the Herald reported.

"The case filed includes both felony and misdemeanor charges of Unlawful Restraint," according to the statement. "At this time, the case is being reviewed by the DA's office. Once an update is available, it will be provided to the public."

The case by Texas authorities isn't the first piece of litigation levied at DeSantis regarding the flights to Martha's Vineyard.

Lawyers for Civil Rights filed the suit on behalf of about 50 Venezuelans involved in the flights, and Alianza Americas, a network of migrant-led organizations supporting immigrants in the U.S. in September 2022.

The lawsuit names DeSantis and Secretary of Florida Department of Transportation Secretary Jared Perdue, and called the flights "inhumane and morally repugnant."

The suit says the Florida officials arranged a "fraudulent and discriminatory scheme to transport nearly 50 vulnerable immigrants, including women and children, from San Antonio, Texas to Martha's Vineyard without shelter or resources in place."

According to the lawsuit, DeSantis used about $615,000 in taxpayer dollars to charter the flights to Martha's Vineyard and told the migrants they would arrive in either Washington, D.C., or Boston. The suit also says the migrants were lured into planes with the promise of benefits, including $10 McDonald's gift cards.

[ncfcatalyst]

DeSantis misplaces taxpayer money for migrant flights

DeSantis misplaces taxpayer money for migrant flights

Florida Gov. and crusader against all things “woke,” Ron DeSantis, stirs up more controversy concerning the use and failure to account for all tax dollars used in his plan to send Texan Migrants to Martha’s Vineyard. The horrific abuse of human rights that stranded 50 migrants in Martha’s Vineyard in September is now relevant again, as approximately $1.4 million in taxpayer money has remained…

[socialjusticeinamerica]

Ron DeSatan and Greg Abbott are criminals that take part in human trafficking as political stunts. Two petty little dictators in states they turned into shitholes.

[cmesinic]

DeSatan will continue to do stupid until the electorate gets smart.

[republicansaredomesticterrorists]

Human trafficking.

[dontmeantobepoliticalbut]

A Massachusetts district attorney said Friday that his office is investigating Florida's decision last year to send flights filled with migrants to Martha's Vineyard.

Cape & Islands District Attorney Robert Galibois also threw his support behind a group of public officials from California and Texas calling for a federal investigation into the flights.

"I am conscious of my obligation to investigate any potentially criminal activity that occurs within my jurisdiction," Galibois said in a statement. "[I] am aware that immigrants were tricked and fooled into boarding planes that ultimately landed in Martha's Vineyard, a part of my jurisdiction. I believe this falls within my purview as District Attorney to investigate. Given that much of the information that I seek to review as part of my investigation falls outside of my jurisdiction, I stand behind California and believe in order for a full and proper investigation to occur, the Department of Justice must be involved. I stand ready to cooperate with the Department of Justice."

Two planes filled with undocumented immigrants landed on Martha's Vineyard last September, leaving the island scrambling to prepare emergency shelters to help them.

The office of Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis said it was responsible for the flights, with a spokesperson saying that night they were "part of the state's relocation program to transport [undocumented immigrants] to sanctuary destinations."

DeSantis, who is running for the Republican presidential nomination in 2024, has touted the flights to Martha's Vineyard in his campaign speeches, falsely claiming island officials "deported them the next day." In reality, they were brought to an emergency shelter on Joint Base Cape Cod before alternative housing was arranged.

Galibois' announcement comes a day before DeSantis will be on Cape Cod for a fundraiser.

In a class action lawsuit, migrants said unidentified people working with DeSantis had been "trolling streets outside of a migrant shelter in Texas and other similar locales, pretending to be good Samaritans offering humanitarian assistance."

The migrants said those people made false promises that if they were willing to board airplanes to other states, they would receive employment, housing, educational opportunities and other assistance.

They also said they were told they would be flown to Boston or Washington, D.C., but were dropped off on Martha's Vineyard without food, water or shelter.

DeSantis' move was widely panned by Massachusetts lawmakers as a "cruel stunt."

"History does not look kindly on leaders who treat human beings like cargo, loading them up and sending them a thousand miles away without telling them their destination," Rep. Bill Keating, D-Massachusetts, said in a tweet.

Earlier this summer, Florida also sent flights filled with migrants to Sacramento. California Gov. Gavin Newsom and Attorney General Rob Bonta both likened the action to kidnapping.

In a letter earlier this month, Newsom and Bonta joined Sheriff Javier Salazar of Bexar County, Texas, to call on the U.S. Department of Justice "to investigate potential violations of federal law by those involved in this scheme."

Salazar's office announced last month that it had recommended criminal charges, including misdemeanor and felony counts of unlawful restraint. No suspects were named. The Sheriff had previously opened an investigation into the flights after saying the migrants were "lured." Charlie Baker, Massachusetts' Governor at the time, said he was supporting that investigation.

[tomorrowusa]

Greg Abbott and Ron DeSantis are transporting migrants to other states to boost their standings with the far right and to draw attention away from festering problems in their own states.

DeSantis is governor of a state which doesn't even have a border with a foreign country, but he's been scooping migrants up in other states and dumping them in California, Massachusetts, and elsewhere.

California Gov. Gavin Newsom is now threatening criminal charges against DeSantis. THIS is what needs to be done. Other blue state governors and attorneys general, please take note!

For the second time in four days, Florida picked up people seeking asylum and took them by private jet to Sacramento at taxpayer expense, California officials said on Monday after another flight arrived at a local airport.

California’s Democratic governor, Gavin Newsom, on Monday branded his rightwing Republican Florida counterpart, Ron DeSantis, a “small, pathetic man”, and appeared to threaten kidnapping charges after the first incident in which a group of migrants was dumped at a Sacramento church.

Rob Bonta, California’s attorney general, said in a statement that 16 South Americans abandoned outside the Roman Catholic Diocese of Sacramento on Friday were “in possession of documentation purporting to be from the state of Florida”, and may have been duped into boarding charter flights via New Mexico after entering the US in Texas. On Monday morning, a second flight of 20 migrants arrived in the state’s capital.

DeSantis is using Florida taxpayer money to conduct these stunts. His rubber stamp legislature lets him get away with stuff like this.

The episode has parallels to what critics called a similar “soulless” stunt orchestrated by DeSantis last year in which his administration abandoned several dozen mostly Venezuelan migrants in Martha’s Vineyard.

Newsom, in a tweet posted Monday lunchtime directed at DeSantis, said: “You small, pathetic man. This isn’t Martha’s Vineyard. Kidnapping charges?” and linked to a section of California’s penal code stating anybody who “abducts or takes by force or fraud” a person found within the state “is guilty of kidnapping”.

Republican governors should not be allowed to conduct kidnappings at taxpayer expense. And their accomplices need to be penalized as well.

“While we continue to collect evidence, I want to say this very clearly: state-sanctioned kidnapping is not a public policy choice, it is immoral and disgusting,” Bonta said in the statement.

The flight was operated by Berry Aviation, an active US defense contractor, according to flight tracking data on FlightRadar24. When reached on the phone, the company declined to comment. Acorn Growth Companies, an aerospace investment firm, which owns Berry Aviation, did not answer calls.

Acorn’s managing partner, Rick Nagel of Oklahoma, is a major Republican fundraiser. He was the campaign treasurer for congressman Tom Cole, who chairs the House rules committee. Cole is a former head of the Republican National Congressional Committee and a fervent backer of Donald Trump’s anti-immigration policies.

Planes and buses used to transport migrants under such circumstances should be impounded as evidence and the companies which own them should be indicted.

Given the disproportionate number of mass shootings in Florida and Texas, DeSantis and Abbott are trying to deflect attention from their failure to keep assault weapons out of the hands of extremists and criminals.

If California and other states issue warrants for the arrest of Ron DeSantis, that might make his campaigning a little more difficult.

[ausetkmt]

BREAKING: Miami Herald drops bombshell, reveals that a Texas Sheriff just recommended criminal charges against those involved in Ron DeSantis tricking migrants into being flown from San Antonio to Martha’s Vineyard to be dumped for a photo op.

But it gets worse for DeSantis… The Sheriff announced that “The case filed includes both FELONY and misdemeanor charges of Unlawful Restraint.” Unfortunately for DeSantis, unlawful restraint is a misdemeanor unless the victim is younger than 17 — as is the case for five of the migrants.

The illegal scheme was cooked up by DeSantis and carried out using Florida tax dollars by DeSantis’ Chief of Staff James Uthmeier.

[little-catholic-diva]

Ok so when are they going to audit Joe who DID use federal money to traffic illegals all over the country for the last year? And how about the children he just sent all over New York and New Jersey last week? I guess it’s different when he does it right?

[beardedmrbean]

Illegal immigrants are looking to flee Florida after a new law in the state of Florida passed, according to people working with migrants who spoke with the Daily Caller News Foundation.

Republican Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis signed a new law May 10 that criminalizes the act of knowingly transporting migrants into the state who entered the country illegally, requires hospitals to obtain patients’ immigration statuses and provides $12 million to the state to  transport migrants. Some illegal immigrants in the area, however, are reconsidering their future in the state over the crackdown, a Department of Homeland Security (DHS) official working in California and an immigration worker told the Daily Caller News Foundation.

“Because of the uncertainty and actions of DeSantis, non-citizens in Florida are looking at other sanctuary cities outside of Florida,” the DHS official told the DCNF.

“A lot of them come here seeking medical benefits and treatments, and with those being difficult to acquire now, a lot of them want to come to states like California, where all those resources are provided,” the DHS official added.

Patricia Andrade, director of Raices Venezolanas Miami, a nongovernmental organization serving Venezuelan immigrants, told DCNF she’s heard from migrants that they fear the use of E-Verify, which is mandatory for many employers in Florida. E-Verify is used by employers to check that job applicants are eligible to work in the country.

“Many are leaving because of E-Verify and some are afraid,” Andrade said.

Roughly 770,000 illegal immigrants live in Florida, according to the Migration Policy Institute.

“We have to leave Florida,” an illegal immigrant living in the Sunshine State for more than a decade told Axios. “I love Florida, I love the weather, I love the people. But I knew we had to leave when I read what was in that law. It isn’t safe.”

DeSantis filed paperwork Wednesday to launch his presidential bid. He is expected to make his formal announcement on a Twitter space with Elon Musk Wednesday evening.

DeSantis has sought to take a hawkish stance on illegal immigration by deploying state resources to the Texas-Mexico border and to Florida’s coastal border. He also transported migrants on flights from Texas to Martha’s Vineyard on Sept. 14.

Immigration advocates quickly criticized the move and launched legal battles, arguing that DeSantis misled the migrants he was transporting.

“So what you’re saying is… the law is working? Good,” DeSantis spokesperson Christina Pushaw wrote on Twitter of illegal immigrants leaving.

[eaudrey35]

California, Texas make legal moves against Florida migrant flights | The Hill

@iamaffscandallover only thing I gotta say is Governor Newsome get his ass. Ron DeSantis and Gregg Abbott done fucked with the wrong Governor and state. I hope Governor Newsome lays the smack down in they ass

[the-tired-tenor]

Ron DeSantis: American Fascist

Florida Governor Ron DeSantis has regularly starred in national headlines over the past few years thanks to a wave of conservative legislation, including the infamous “Don't Say Gay” bill and subsequent retaliation against Disney for speaking out against it. While this legislation has made him the hero of the far-right sect of the GOP, many on the other side of the political aisle have a different word for him: fascist.

Fascism is used to describe a totalitarian and discriminatory form of government - one which strictly controls what its citizens can say, do, or be, and backs those restrictions up with the threat of violence. In the Spring of 2003, Lawrence W. Britt published a list of 14 defining characteristics of fascism, which reads as follows:

1. Powerful and continuing expressions of nationalism

2. Disdain for the importance of human rights

3. Identification of enemies/scapegoats as a unifying cause

4. The supremacy of the military/avid militarism

5. Rampant sexism

6. A controlled mass media

7. Obsession with national security

8. Religion and ruling elite tied together

9. Power of corporations protected

10. Power of labor suppressed or eliminated

11. Disdain and suppression of intellectuals and the arts

12. Obsession with crime and punishment

13. Rampant cronyism and corruption

14. Fraudulent elections

Today, I will be examining each of these characteristics as they relate to the political activities of Ron DeSantis, and using what we find to determine whether he really is a fascist.

First, we have “powerful and continuing displays of nationalism.” DeSantis regularly makes displays of Christian nationalism, telling his supporters to “put on the full armor of God” to defeat his political allies, as well as white nationalism. For examples of the latter, look no further than his suppression of materials as they relate to racial diversity in our schools, as well as his law that prohibits teaching lessons that “may cause students to feel guilty” about their race, such as lessons about slavery, Jim Crow, and reconstruction.

Next, “disdain for the importance of human rights.” The evidence for this point is truly overwhelming; highlights include his flight of migrants to Martha's Vineyard, where he lied about their destination and accommodations to coerce vulnerable minorities onto a plane, the infamous “Don't Say Gay” bill, and his latest catchphrase, “Florida is where woke goes to die.”

“Identification of scapegoats for a unifying cause” is similarly easy to pick out; for years, DeSantis and his allies have slandered teachers, gay and queer parents, and most recently transgender individuals, using rhetoric against those groups as calls to action for his base. More specifically, they have recently claimed that LGBTQ teachers are “grooming” students to become gay or transgender, despite there being not a scrap of evidence to support this.

“Supremacy of the military” has always been a Republican ideal, with trillions on trillions of dollars in funding going to defense each year while critical infrastructure and the state education system crumbles.

“Sexism” is harder to identify, as most politicians know at this point that openly saying “men are better than women” is political suicide. With that in mind, it is worth noting that DeSantis has frequently expressed support for and belief in “traditional” gender roles, especially in conjunction with condemning transgender people. See also the recent passage of ever more restrictive abortion bans in the state

Next, “controlled mass media.” There's a single recent event which I will highlight here, which is the recent introduction of a bill which would require anyone who writes about DeSantis or his cabinet members to register with the state government. This is the most mask-off attempt I've seen thus far to control the media, and while I don't think it will stand, it's deeply concerning that anyone is even trying it. Recent sweeping bans on school reading material also falls into this category.

“Obsession with national security” is another point common to Republican legislators. The last few years have seen a growing obsession with keeping migrants and immigrants out of the country, including the recent Martha's Vineyard stunt by DeSantis himself.

DeSantis often invokes the Christian God, as do most of his contemporaries, when justifying legislation or rallying followers, so “Religion and ruling elite tied together” is another easy check off the list.

“Power of corporations protected” might seem like an easy miss for DeSantis after his recent scuffle with Disney, but looking at the companies that don't dare to criticize him tells a different story, which goes hand-in-hand with the next point, “power of labor suppressed or eliminated.” Florida is a right-to-work state, which already removes some power from workers, but DeSantis has taken aim at unions over the last few years. Most recently and publicly, teachers’ unions have been a target.

“Disdain for and suppression of intellectuals and the arts” is also represented by DeSantis’ attack on teachers unions (and teachers themselves), but we can also look at recent restrictions placed on state universities, not least of which is the wildly unpopular and blatant takeover of New College. He is also the force behind expanding education jobs to favor candidates from law enforcement and military backgrounds via the lowering of standards and offers of special bonuses to those candidates.

For “obsession with crime and punishment,” look no further than the criminalization of abortion, ballooning police budgets, and the removal of an elected state attourney in Tampa who said he would deprioritize the prosecution of misdemeanors.

This is also an example of “Rampant cronyism and corruption,” as this attourney was removed specifically because he spoke out against DeSantis - despite this being a clear violation of his 1st amendment rights. We can also see cronyism in the recent takeover of New College, in which several high-profile allies of DeSantis were appointed to take over the once-liberal college's leadership. Whistleblowers during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic were also persecuted by the state when they spoke out against DeSantis’ narrative that COVID was no big deal. We can also look to the recent hostile and unwelcome takeover o New College, where DeSantis installed political allies in positions of power at the college over loud and constant student and faculty objections.

Finally, we come to “fraudulent elections.” For this point, I would point readers to DeSantis’ blatant and unconstitutional gerrymandering leading up to the 2022 election - when lawmakers drew up a map that gave the GOP a modest advantage over state democrats, DeSantis threw it out and provided his own, which was so aggressively gerrymandered that he had to overrule his own party members, who balked at how aggressive - and likely unlawful - his map was in order to put it in place before the election. Additionally, see the recently introduced bill which would dissolve the Democratic Party in the state of Florida, effectively resulting in a single-party government with no competition.

Based on this examination of Governor DeSantis’ behaviors, as well as the overall behaviors of the party which he is a part of, I feel very comfortable saying: Ron DeSantis is a fascist. Specifically, he is a Christian Fascist who regularly justifies his decisions with religion, despite the intentions of our country’s founders to separate the church from political power. He is not the small-government defender of personal freedoms that he masquerades as, but an authoritarian bully who uses the levers of state power to enforce his bigotry, protect the power of his corporate donors, and force his religious views onto the citizens of his state.

Rather than use his power as a legislator to make improvements to the lives of the people he governs by doing things like fix infrastructure, fight inflation in the housing market, or protect vulnerable people from the whims of corporate interests, DeSantis is content to demonize vulnerable minorities in order to create infighting within the working class and distract from his immorality, hypocrisy, and blatant power grabs. Ron DeSantis is anti-liberty, anti-democracy, and anti-American, and should be removed from the levers of political power as soon as legally possible.