DeSantis Defends Migrant Flights and Takes a Swipe at California
Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida on Wednesday defended his state’s sending three dozen Latin American migrants to Sacramento on recent charter flights from the border, saying California had “incentivized” illegal immigration and ought to pay the costs.
“These sanctuary jurisdictions are part of the reason we have this problem, because they have endorsed and agitated for these types of open-border policies,” Mr. DeSantis said during his first visit to the southern border since starting his presidential campaign. “They have bragged that they are sanctuary jurisdictions. They attacked the previous administration’s efforts to try to have border security.”
Democratic officials in California, including Gov. Gavin Newsom, have said Florida’s taxpayer-funded operation to move migrants to Sacramento could merit criminal or civil charges. They said the migrants, who arrived on Monday and last Friday, were misled into boarding the planes with false promises of jobs before being left outside a church building. In criticizing the flights, Mr. Newsom resorted to unusually personal terms, calling Mr. DeSantis a “small, pathetic man.”
On Wednesday, Mr. DeSantis took a shot back at Mr. Newsom, comparing California’s budget deficit to his own state’s fiscal surplus. “We have a good managed state,” he said at a round-table discussion in Sierra Vista, Ariz., that included law enforcement officials from Florida, Arizona and Texas. Mr. DeSantis was appearing in his official capacity as governor.
Source: The New York Times
