Florida is seeing more and more boat people from Haiti, Cuba, and other countries appear off its Atlantic coast. Following the arrival of more than 700 seaborne migrants on the New Year’s holiday weekend, Gov. Ron DeSantis declared a state of emergency and activated the state’s National Guard. This prompted White House spokesgirl Karine Jean-Pierre to accuse DeSantis of pulling off another “political stunt.” (Were Jean-Pierre capable of embarrassment, she might have experienced it a few hours later when the U.S. Coast Guard actually asked DeSantis for the state’s assistance!)
Meanwhile, the illegal landings have continued. Yesterday–Thursday, January 12–a sailboat overloaded with 25 Haitians landed at Virginia Key. Two days before, on Tuesday night, Border Patrol agents took into custody a total of 31 migrants from Cuba, Haiti, Brazil, and the Bahamas in a couple of incidents off the coast near Fort Lauderdale and Key Colony Beach, respectively.
Sometimes, apprehended illegal migrants are actually returned to their native countries. For example, the Coast Guard claims to have returned to Cuba 273 of those who arrived over New Year’s. Yet, even when some are returned–often to try again, of course–the damage and wreckage they leave behind falls on Floridians to clean up. One homeowner at Key Colony Beach said he had to pay at least $2,500 to have an abandoned boat cleaned and sterilized after it landed on his property with about 20 Cuban illegal migrants. Government officials took the migrants away but left the boat. The homeowner said he was told by local officials that the junked boat was his problem, not the government’s.
Gov. DeSantis responded by declaring that the state, once again stepping in where Washington has abdicated its responsibility, will pay for the crafts’ removal. In a video released by DeSantis’s office, he said:
There’s vessels left everywhere [on] people’s property. We declared a state of emergency. We provided [the] Coast Guard the assistance that they’ve asked for. We are going to clear the vessels free of charge for those residents because it wasn’t their fault.
Then the governor added, “Maybe we’ll send the bill to Biden.” Which would of course be yet another “political stunt,” per Ms. Jean-Pierre.
For more, see Fox News.