The latest spark came when Florida Gov. Ron DeSandis (R) organized two flights of migrants to Martha’s Vineyard in Massachusetts on September 14.
Apart from the fact that around 50 people, many of them originally from Venezuela, were taken to the island, little else is agreed upon.
DeSantis has championed the move and receives significant support from Republicans and conservatives.
But the flights have caused an uproar on the left and among immigration advocates. Some of the immigrants have filed class-action lawsuits against DeSantis, other Democratic politicians have implied that he has committed crimes, and even a Texas sheriff has gotten involved.
DeSantis appears adamant that there will be more flights.
Here are the main legal issues.
The group costume of immigrants
The class-action lawsuit filed Tuesday is the most dramatic and concrete legal development to date.
The suit was filed in federal court in Massachusetts. He takes aim at DeSantis, Florida Transportation Secretary Jared Perdue and the state of Florida.
At the heart of the case is the allegation that the immigrants were lured onto the flights by false promises — “fraudulent inducement” in legal terms — and that that means DeSantis and his allies violated those immigrants’ rights and committed fraud.
It claims the migrants were approached outside a shelter in San Antonio by mysterious people who won their trust by giving them little perks like McDonald’s coupons.
In one instance, “several dozen people” were reportedly asked to sign a document to receive a $10 McDonald’s gift card.
The document, according to the legal filing, “was not fully translated into Spanish: an entire paragraph about liability and transportation was not translated at all, and the language stating that the trip would be from Texas to Massachusetts was not translated at all. ”
The plaintiffs also allege they were given brochures titled “Massachusetts Refugee Benefits” promising broad assistance with housing, clothing and transportation to job interviews.
In fact, the pamphlet was written by Florida officials, the lawsuit alleges. Massachusetts’ actual refugee resettlement plan, the filing notes, has “very specific requirements for which no member of the putative class is eligible.”
The class action, joined by Alianza Americas, a network of immigrant-led organizations, outlines 12 different “causes of action,” including Fourth Amendment and Fourteenth Amendment violations and intentional infliction of emotional distress.
One of the attorneys representing the immigrants, Oren Sellstrom, told The Hill, “Our complaint alleges a number of violations of both the US Constitution and federal laws. A state governor cannot fraudulently induce vulnerable people to board a plane and cross state lines.”
Sellstrom, the litigation director at Lawyers for Civil Rights, described the alleged behavior as shocking.
“You describe it and then you almost have to step back and realize that it actually happened, it was actually orchestrated by an American governor,” he said.
DeSantis’ team counters that the immigrants took the flights voluntarily — a claim that, if proven true, would negate most, if not all, of the lawsuit’s claims.
Taryn Feske, communications director for DeSantis, said in a statement that the relocations were done on a “voluntary basis.”
DeSantis’ office also provided reporters with a copy of the consent forms, which list “Massachusetts” as the final destination, and which they say the immigrants signed.
“Immigrants were homeless, hungry and abandoned – and these activists didn’t care then,” Feske said. “The Florida program gave them a fresh start in a sanctuary state, and these individuals chose to take advantage of the charter flights to Massachusetts.”
DeSantis himself told Fox News’ Sean Hannity on Monday: “It was clearly voluntary and all the other nonsense you’re hearing is not true.”
The Democrats’ accusations of possible criminality
Along with the civil lawsuit, Democratic politicians have asked the Department of Justice (DOJ) to investigate whether crimes may have been committed by the Florida governor or people working on his behalf.
The most prominent figure to do so is California Gov. Gavin Newsom (D), who has repeatedly tangled with DeSantis in recent months.
Each man is considered a potential candidate for the 2024 presidency.
Last week, Newsom wrote a public letter to Attorney General Merrick Garland.
He encouraged Garland to investigate whether the alleged fraudulent inducements offered to immigrants “would support kidnapping charges under relevant state statutes” — which could, in turn, “serve as a predicate offense” for charges of so-called RICO statues, which were originally designed to fight organized crime.
A Democratic state representative in Massachusetts, Dylan Fernandez, called for an investigation along similar lines.
On Sept. 18, he tweeted that the Justice Department should investigate “legal implications related to fraud, kidnapping, deprivation of liberty, and human trafficking.”
Of course, if DeSantis’ defense that the migrants took the flights voluntarily, the kidnapping claims would go nowhere.
Even those sympathetic to the plight of immigrants see major challenges to prosecution.
It seems doubtful that the Justice Department would bring criminal charges against a sitting governor—and potential presidential candidate—on an issue as charged and polarizing as immigration unless the evidence of wrongdoing was absolutely clear.
“The FBI and the Department of Justice should probably look into this. They have almost no choice,” said Jesse Bless, an immigration attorney.
Referring to the alleged behavior by government officials, Bless said: “You certainly could not do this to a US citizen — and to people in the US, regardless of [immigration] status, they have protection of political rights”.
However, at the same time, Bless acknowledged, “I don’t know what the cure would be.”
“Is DeSantis Going to Jail?” he added, making it clear that he sees such an end result as unlikely.
The sheriff’s investigation
Among the oddities of the Martha’s Vineyard episode, one stands out: The series of events began in Texas, not Florida.
Many of the migrants claim their first point of contact was outside or near the shelter in San Antonio. There, they say they were contacted by unknown people — a woman gave her name as “Perla” — who set in motion the process that eventually landed them in Massachusetts.
Their flights, in fact, originally left Texas before arriving in Florida en route to Massachusetts.
That, in turn, led the sheriff of Bexar County, Texas — where San Antonio is located — to launch his own investigation.
But Sheriff Javier Salazar, a Democrat, has been more vague than others in describing exactly what he is investigating.
Salazar told reporters he believes the immigrants were “lured in under false pretenses,” including the promise of work. He said they were “exploited and hoodwinked”.
But Salazar’s broad statements make it difficult to assess where his research will go.
Speaking on CNN this week, he noted, regarding DeSantis, “I have not said and I will not say … that I have the governor under investigation.”
The fiscal questions
In addition to the more dramatic accusations being thrown back and forth over the legality of migrant flights, the more mundane issue of the budget has also received attention.
The flights were funded by a $12 million item in Florida’s budget that was overwhelmingly approved by state lawmakers earlier this year.
But this measure, and its interpretation, is the subject of fresh debate.
First, as Politico and other media outlets have noted, the budget legislation required the money to be used to transport “unauthorized aliens from this state.”
Democrats and immigrant advocates are returning to the point that the immigrant journey began in Texas, not Florida.
They also add that people outside the US have a legal right to seek asylum and have those claims adjudicated. In other words, they are not unauthorized aliens.
Republicans and others with a harder line on immigration argue that there is no language problem since immigrants show up at the U.S. border without the required documents to enter the country.
Separately, there is controversy about the origin of the money.
Democrats say it clearly came from interest the state earned on COVID-19 stimulus payments from the federal government. A Washington Post report last week said DeSantis’ office “did not respond to multiple questions about the source of the funds or whether the $12 million in Covid aid had been used for the flights to Martha’s Vineyard.”
In a recent press conference, DeSantis stated, “I have 12 million to use and that’s how we’re going to use it.” His intention seems to be to continue the migratory flights until the money runs out.
The immigrants who have filed the class action claim this amounts to using COVID-19 relief funds for “unauthorized purposes.”
Others, not quite so far, said the episode shows a gap in the provision of these funds that other states could…
