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The state of Florida filed a lawsuit Tuesday against the administration of President Joe Biden, for immigration policies, including the so-called “catch and release”, which allows the release of undocumented immigrants who were detained after crossing the border, which the governor of the state, Ron DeSantis, called “illegal” and “destructive.”
“The illegal border policies of the Biden administration cause damage” to this state’s “quasi-sovereign interests” of this state by forcing it to “incur expenses of millions of dollars,” the lawsuit, filed by state Attorney General Ashley Moody in federal court in Pensacola, North Florida, stresses.
“We want the predecessor policies” of the Government of Donald Trump (2017-2021) on immigration to be reinstated, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, a Republican, said today at a press conference in which he criticized what he considers “destructive immigration policies” and “open borders.”
The governor said that since Biden took office last January the Border Patrol “has released nearly a quarter-million illegal aliens” into the country.
“It is absolutely a crisis,” said DeSantis, who used the press conference to announce the appointment of former U.S. Attorney Larry Keefe as the state’s new Public Safety “czar.”
DeSantis said the crisis has been created following the elimination of immigration policies such as “Remain in Mexico” instituted in 2019 by Trump.
The governor said many of those asylum seekers “do not even qualify” for asylum, and rather the numbers “speak for themselves.”
Crisis resulting from Biden’s immigration policies
Customs and Border Protection (CBP) revealed this month that more than 208,000 undocumented immigrants were apprehended at the southern border last August, down 2 % from more than 212,000 in July, when the highest peak in 20 years was reached.
The governor noted that in July more than 60,000 illegal aliens were apprehended and subsequently released by the Border Patrol, a “gigantic increase” over the 1,324 in this category who were released in January.
He added that in the last full month of the Trump Administration only 17 people falling into that category were released.
The lawsuit is against the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and subordinate agencies such as Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), as well as the Secretary of Homeland Security himself, Alejandro Mayorkas, whom DeSantis, as he recalled today, asked last month to restore Trump’s immigration policies.
Attorney Moody said that Florida spends about $100 million each year to “incarcerate undocumented immigrants,” in addition to other amounts added and that are related to social services.
“The drug cartels are having a picnic, they are seeing their profits rise,” Moody exclaimed.
At the conference, DeSantis announced the signing of an executive order by which, among other things, prohibits all Florida agencies under the governor’s purview from “facilitating illegal immigration” to this state, in addition to asking them to collect information “on the scope and costs of illegal immigration.”
He specified that Keefe will be in charge of overseeing the scope of the order, as well as everything related to immigration in this state.
“As a former federal prosecutor, I saw illegal aliens who were deported and returned, and then were deported and returned, in an endless cycle,” the new czar said today.
