Immigration Policy in America

[LFC]

I decided to resurrect an old TRS thread since this seems to be an issue that the Republicans are going to continue to push. First up we have DeSatanist's sick ploy (also performed by Abbott) of shipping immigrants to blue states without any warning to the people shipped or the people at the destination. One note should be made up front. The infrastructure to handle immigrants was largely dismantled by Trump with Republicans' blessing. All they wanted to offer was a stupid, ineffective wall and ripping children away from their parents. (paywalled)

Gov. DeSantis got a state law passed in Florida to ship migrants out of Florida and send them to high profile liberal parts of the country as a sort of performative cruelty. So far so good. But The Miami Herald now reports that those Venezuelan migrants don’t appear to have started off in Florida. They appear to have been brought from Texas. At least that’s what a number of them say. And flight records show the flights did originate in Texas.

There were two flights and they made stops in Crestview, Florida and Charlotte, North Carolina. Both started in Texas. Florida picked up the tab.

The Herald asked DeSantis details about where the immigrants started but his office didn’t respond. At a press conference today he seemed to imply that his dramatic action prevented, in the Herald’s words, “those migrants from ever making it into Florida.” So he seems to be saying it’s like the preemptive war of immigrant abuse. He shipped them off before they even got to Florida.

This may matter in a narrow sense in Florida since the money DeSantis used is for transporting migrants out of Florida. If he transported them from somewhere else to Martha’s Vineyard the money was spent on an unauthorized purpose. But apart from Florida law, where did these people come from? Could he not find any migrants to use in Florida and had to rustle some up in Texas? Gov. Abbott says his state wasn’t involved.

[LFC]

OK, where's the money coming from? If it's the state of Floriduh, there could be issues. If private funds, there could be issues.

The Post now reports that at a GOP donor retreat last weekend DeSantis bragged that he had a pot of money for shipping migrants to liberal parts of the country and that he might go to Texas to find immigrants to send. “I do have this money. I want to be helpful. Maybe we will go to Texas and help. Maybe we’ll send to Chicago, Hollywood, Martha’s Vineyard. Who knows?”

[LFC]

Another paywalled piece on DeSatanist's moves potentially breaking the law.

Aaron Blake and TPM alum Greg Sargent both had pieces in the Post yesterday looking at whether these immigrant transport stunts might break the law. There are a number of interesting legal complexities. One has to do with whether they’re “illegal” or “undocumented”. There are laws against knowingly transporting such immigrants or doing so to further them committing crimes. But in most cases these are people who have been processed as asylum seekers and are awaiting an asylum hearing. So until that hearing they are in the country legally. So that doesn’t really apply. It’s also unclear what state government authorities might be authorized to do as opposed to federal authorities. But the operative issue seems to be whether people are coerced or deceived into being transported.

It seems clear that the Venezuelan migrants who ended up in Martha’s Vineyard were lied to. They were told they were going to Boston and that they would be given working papers, 90 days of support and various other services there. More reporting is going to be necessary to find out precisely what they were told. It seems quite likely that since they were being lied to “Perla” (the organizer of this scheme) told different people different things to get them on the plane. But if there’s a legal problem it’s likely tied to the mix of fraud and crossing state lines.

As a political matter, though, I think the dangling part of this that could come back to bite DeSantis is the issue of why they sent some crew to Texas to get these people. In political terms weird can sometimes be worse than wrong. Did he want to have a stunt where he was ridding Florida of unwanted migrants but couldn’t find any and had to go to Texas? Does Texas have more Perlas who will trick people standing outside immigrant shelters into getting into planes on behalf of politically thirsty governors? And did DeSantis use Florida taxpayers money that was only approved harassing immigrants in Florida? By a moral calculus these are comparatively trivial questions, but they may paradoxically be the most significant in other ways.

[LFC]

It's quickly becoming clear that DeSatanist's stunt was an immoral, corrupt, and possible illegal shitshow. Sounds about what I'd expect out of this little fascist dictator wannabe.

Here’s more pieces of the puzzle. We now learn that “Perla”, the woman who coaxed the migrants on to the DeSantis Air flights under false pretenses paid another migrant, a 27 year old Venezuelan named Emmanuel, for the contact information of the migrants Perla would eventually coax onto the plane. Emmanuel gave her contact info for about 10 migrants he’d met at the migrant center where they were saying.

Emmanuel told The San Antonio Report that he was at first hesitant to give Perla, who he described as a blonde driving a white truck, the migrants’ contact information. Perla told him the money came from an “anonymous benefactor” who was also paying for the flights.

Emmanuel showed the reporter, Raquel Torres, a picture of Perla’s business card which included her first name and a phone number that went unanswered Thursday evening.

What seems clear now is that “Perla” was tasked with organizing or procuring Venezuelan immigrants in Texas for the flights to Martha’s Vineyard which Ron DeSantis was organized and paid for by the state of Florida.

Offering lies to desperate people so they can be used as little political puppets. How very ... Christian.

[Bact PhD]

But…and it’s a HUGE “but”…
1. Supreme Emperor is playing to the viewers of Fox/OAN. Niceties like whether such a stunt is “technically legal” are immaterial to them.
2. The cruelty towards “those people” is the point, period.
3. Supreme Emperor is running for re-election, and at least one poll has him and Crist in a statistical dead heat. Remember the maxim, “No publicity is bad publicity” — Supreme Emperor’s name MUST stay in the headlines, regardless.
4. Supreme Emperor is aiming unabashedly for 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue — evidently his wife is shamelessly pushing him as well. Here’s a link to a Tweet with the quote and a further reference to a NYT article;

“You have a moment,” huh? Well, to quote the physicist, Even Dumbbells Have Their Moments.” (sorry, couldn’t resist)

[jackd]

There are all kinds of moments. Some of them are highly visible failures and tragedies. Disantis appears to me (of course I'm biased) to have little or no personal appeal. Much as I dislike Trump, I have to concede his talent for whipping up partisans.

[LFC]

DeSatanist's spokesperson just admitted they're like cartels who smuggle humans. Nice.

DeSantis Spox Brags About Boss Trafficking Humans Like Cartels

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) sent two chartered planes carrying Venezuelan migrants to Martha’s Vineyard earlier this week in a blatantly political MAGA display to impress GOP donors.

• Lawyers for the migrants say their clients were lied to about having jobs and shelter waiting for them there.

• It appears as though the migrants didn’t even come from Florida and that DeSantis actually had them picked up from Texas (imagine how happy Texas Gov. Greg Abbot, who’s been trying to pull similar stunts, would be about that).

• And DeSantis’ genius deputy press secretary tried to defend the grotesque gambit yesterday by essentially agreeing that yes, his boss was, in fact, doing a human trafficking.

Here’s some relevant history:

[LFC]

More on just how sick and twisted DeSatanist's little piece of political performance art really was.

[pnwguy]

I’m sure glad the GOP is the Christian Pro-Life Pro-Honesty party. I need to give them every penny to help beat down these criminals invading the country God created for white people.

[LFC]

Heather Cox Richardson once again lays out the reality of the situation. Republicans are lying pieces of shit who have no problem playing games or breaking the law for political advantage. Desperate people? Children? All just props to them. She covers the current situation but gives a great summary of where immigration and immigration policy have been and where we stand today.

The second story is the history of American immigration, which is far more complicated and interesting than the current news stories suggest.

[andydp]

I was mulling over the fact the Air DeSantis flights started in Texas.  Why Texas and not Florida ?

Very simple: there are a LOT of Cuban Immigrants in Florida.  They have "special" refugee status simply because they fled the "godless Commies" in Cuba. Coincidentally, they are also a large GOP voting block.  It wouldn't do if you rounded up a bunch of Hispanics and later found out they were Cubans who have relatives in Miami.

Texas on the other hand, is full of immigrants with no special status who come from places other than Cuba.  Problem solved.  Lots of air time and De Santis owns the libs.

[jackd]

Most of the people recently featured are Venezuelan. There is a substantial Venezuelan community in Florida also; not nearly the size of the Cuban community.

[LFC]

An on the ground view of what really happens with asylum seekers.

I volunteer as a translator with asylees coming through the Texas border and I wanted to make a thread on who these migrants are, what help is actually needed and why what DeSantis and Abbott are doing is so needlessly cruel.

Everyone is talking about it, but so few understand

WHO ARE THESE IMMIGRANTS?

The first and most important thing you should understand, these are LEGAL asylum seekers. They are not illegals. They are not undocumented.

They have been given permission by our government to enter the US pending their official court date.
The law ONLY requires that asylum seekers be present on US soil and that they present themselves to officials to request asylum.

That is it.

Anyone who calls them illegal immigrants is really telling on themselves and deliberately trying to confuse the issue.
Once they present themselves to border officials, they are processed and then given a court date to officially plead their case.

This court date is almost always a year away and in a major city far from the border, like Boston, NY, Miami, Chicago, etc.
You can always spot the asylum seekers coming out of detention facilities because they don't have shoelaces (story for another day) and they have court papers in one hand.

Another thing I would note, the Biden admin is STILL immediately deporting the vast majority of asylees.
The folks that make it through come from the most harrowing conditions you can imagine. I have met whole families who had to flee El Salvador on foot because gangs threatened to kill them if their son did not join.

I met a man who was attacked by police for leading a protest.
In almost every case, these are smart, hard working CHRISTIAN refugees. Their ability to assimilate into America and thrive is limitless. They love America. They just want a chance to live and thrive in peace.

WHAT HELP DO THEY NEED?

Because these groups already have court dates and in almost every case, they have family they can stay with, they only really need two things: short term food and shelter and transportation.

And I mean short term. Usually less than 12 hours.

[LFC]

Two good questions.

[LFC]

Josh Marshall says that none of DeSatanist's moves make sense. I suspect the identity of a key, wealthy player missing. In full due to paywall.

Most of the news discussion about the DeSantis/Martha’s Vineyard saga appears to have moved on to chin-scratching pieces about what it all means or how the politics might shake out. That’s premature. The fact that DeSantis would pull a stunt like this is entirely unsurprising if also morally obscene. But if it was his work why did he fly migrants from Texas? There’s been no clear or really any explanation for why this would be the case. He’s vaguely suggested that he was flying them from Texas before they could come to Florida. But the details about how the migrants were found in San Antonio doesn’t suggest anything like that. DeSantis won’t discuss it.

It also seems clear that this wasn’t arranged by actual government employees. At a minimum it was delegated to private parties who quite possibly broke a few laws to do it. The woman “Perla” seems to have disappeared and gave one migrant a card with only her first name and a phone number. That’s not a government employee, at least not one working on the books.

Something’s amiss here. An independent publication called San Antonio Report has been publishing some of the clearest and most relevant detail about the story. A new piece from a few hours ago explains some details about the charter jet that ferried the migrants. It brings up another odd detail. The charter company is a luxury private jet company that normally caters to corporate executives and sports teams. Why that company? One possible clue is provided by the San Antonio Report article: Ultimate Air Shuttle flies frequently to Martha’s Vineyard. The planes used usually work the east coast, not Texas.

This afternoon a number of publications reported that a week ago Florida hired a Florida-based aviation company called Vertol Systems Company Inc to run its immigrant relocation program, making an initial payment of $615,000. Most of these publications have assumed that company ran the flights to Martha’s Vineyard. But that’s not the case. It was Ultimate Air, as we noted above. It’s possible that Vertol subcontracted the flights to Ultimate Air. But why? It has its own fleet of planes and Ultimate Air doesn’t usually operate those specific planes in Texas. And if it’s subcontracting, why would it do so to a company for high-end executive air travel?

Basically nothing about this story adds up. The details don’t make any sense. It looks like an off the books operation possibly funded by the state of Florida but maybe not? I can’t explain DeSantis would say if it’s his operation if it weren’t. And I’m not saying it’s not. But really, none of this adds up.

[AnBr]

I heard an interesting thought about possible charges that could be brought against DeSantis. Apparently they were promised jobs and free housing before being taken to Martha's Vineyard. Sending or luring people across state lines with deceptions triggers federal kidnapping laws.

[jackd]

One difficulty in all of that is identifying who made the promises. At last report it was a woman who only gave her first name.

[LFC]

Sept 19, 2022 1:55:22 GMT jackd said:

One difficulty in all of that is identifying who made the promises. At last report it was a woman who only gave her first name.

The tweet I put up above referred to her as a "coyote." Probably pretty accurate, just one hired by a Republican governor who wants to be POTUS.

[jackd]

Again, proving DiSantis hired her is a problem. As I understand it, he admits to "Involvement"in their transport but not to hiring her and denies any participation in her alleged promises.

[indy]

I would be extremely surprised to find any of his fingerprints even remotely connected to her as that would be a pretty epic level of stupidity. Potentially there might be some sort of link through various people but it would almost certainly result in plausible deniability.

[LFC]

Again, proving DiSantis hired her is a problem.

I would be extremely surprised to find any of his fingerprints even remotely connected to her as that would be a pretty epic level of stupidity.

True. It's not like this guy is Donald Trump. He's much, much more dangerous.

[LFC]

Somebody from Clown Hall proving that, as always, the cruelty is the point. There isn't a shred of decency or morality among this bunch. They simply become sexually aroused at the thought of hurting people who, for some stupid reason, they don't like.

[LFC]

Who is "Perla", DeSatanist's mystery coyote? In full.

The national news media seems to have lost interest entirely in the story of the Venezuelan immigrants shipped off to Martha’s Vineyard as part of Gov. Ron DeSantis’s reelection campaign. The meta-story of course continues to get some attention — how it plays into the midterm, who it helps or hurts as a political story, etc. But I mean what actually happened. That’s unfortunate both in journalistic and political terms because even the barest look at the details we know make it very unlikely this was an official or on-the-books government operation. And yet it’s one Gov. Desantis has publicly taken credit for and said was paid for with taxpayer funds from Florida.

In the absence of any national press interest the search for answers has been left to a few local news outlets and LULAC, the Latino civil rights organization. Representatives of LULAC, including national president Domingo Garcia, went to Martha’s Vineyard on Friday to talk to the asylum-seekers and get more details about what happened. They were able to flesh out the story about “Perla” and her team in San Antonio. Basically all the stories matched to a T. LULAC has posted a $5,000 reward for information leading to her identification. LULAC is also canvassing this week in San Antonio trying to find out more information.

From articles in the Cape Cod Times and the San Antonio Report, we learn that Perla was a tall blonde woman with a light complexion. She reportedly worked with two other women and two men, one of whom drove a white pickup. They apparently housed the migrants at a hotel near the airport for multiple days as they attempted to reach a quota. The quota was apparently 60 and they were disappointed they weren’t able to get a sufficient number of people. Nothing about this sounds remotely like any kind of state government run or directed operation. At least not on the books.

Judd Legum of Popular Information got a copy of a brochure the migrants were provided allegedly describing benefits available in Massachusetts, which was apparently fabricated by those behind the operation. The brochure was given to Legum by a group called Lawyers for Civil Rights, which says it has information that can be used to identify the people in question.

There seems to be a legitimate argument that what happened broke federal laws because the individuals were induced to get on a plane and travel across state lines based on false information. What should interest us more than the specific laws is that this clearly was not a state action. It looks much more like Project Veritas-type stunt. I’m not saying Veritas was behind it. I don’t think they are. But that kind of group: right-wing pranksters. In some way, DeSantis was either coordinating with them or funding them. It’s very much worth finding out which it is. You cannot look at any of this and think it was the work of government workers. Just not how those people operate. This is not to mention the fact that it still hasn’t been explained how or why the state of Florida had people prowling around a refugee center in Texas looking for people who could be coaxed to get on a plane which would fly surreptitiously to Martha’s Vineyard.

There’s a big story here and it’s no surprise that DeSantis is refusing to answer specific questions.

[jackd]

It shouldn't be too difficult to find out who paid for the flight.

[Bact PhD]

Things are about to get a LOT more interesting: The Bexar County (TX) Sheriff is VERY interested in what exactly went down in his jurisdiction:

www.nbcnews.com/news/latino/texas-sheriff-opens-criminal-investigation-marthas-vineyard-migrant-tr-rcna48411

A Texas sheriff said Monday that his office has opened a criminal investigation into Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis’ unprecedented move to send nearly 50 migrants from Texas to Martha’s Vineyard, Massachusetts, last week.

Bexar County Sheriff Javier Salazar said the inquiry was in its early stages, and he declined to name possible suspects. But in a news conference, he said: “Everybody on this call knows who those names are already.”

Salazar said it was not clear whether any laws had been broken, but he said that 48 migrants appeared to have been “lured under false pretenses” into staying at a hotel for a couple of days before they were flown to Florida and Martha’s Vineyard.

“They were promised work,” he said. “They were promised the solution to several of their problems.”

He said a recruiter was paid a "bird dog fee" to gather roughly 50 people around a San Antonio migrant resource center.

Ruh roh, Raggy!