SACRAMENTO, Calif. -- The state of Florida picked up asylum-seekers on the Texas border Monday and took them by private jet to California's capital city at taxpayer expense for the second time in four days, California officials said, prompting allegations that migrants were misled and catching shelters and aid workers by surprise.
Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis and other state officials were mum, as they were initially last year when they flew 49 Venezuelan migrants to the upscale Massachusetts enclave of Martha's Vineyard, luring them onto private jets from a shelter in San Antonio.
As California Attorney General Rob Bonta investigated the migrants' transportation, local officials and faith-based groups sought to provide housing, food and other resources to the more than three dozen new arrivals.
Bonta said he was preparing to file charges for the stunt. Those charges could include false imprisonment and kidnapping, as well as violations of California's unfair competition law, Bonta told ABC News.
"While we continue to collect evidence, I want to say this very clearly: State-sanctioned kidnapping is not a public policy choice, it is immoral and disgusting," Bonta said in a statement. "We are a nation built by immigrants and we must condemn the cruelty and hateful rhetoric of those, whether they are state leaders or private parties, who refuse to recognize humanity and who turn their backs on extending dignity and care to fellow human beings."
The California Department of Justice has not publicly released copies of the documents, citing an ongoing investigation. But department spokesperson Tara Gallegos said the paperwork reveals that the program's contractor is Vertol Systems Co. -- the same one behind the flight last year that transported dozens of Venezuelan asylum-seekers from San Antonio to Martha's Vineyard.
Many of the migrants were from Colombia and Venezuela, and California had not been their intended destination.
California Gov. Gavin Newsom, meanwhile, lashed out at DeSantis as a "small, pathetic man" and suggested the state could pursue kidnapping charges.
"This isn't Martha's Vineyard," Newsom's tweet read, before pointing to California's state code around kidnapping.
The code stipulates that anyone who abducts a person "by force or fraud" and brings or sends them to California can be found guilty of kidnapping.
And as the migrants arrived in California, a Texas sheriff's office announced Monday it has recommended criminal charges over the two flights to Martha's Vineyard last year.
Johnny Garcia, a spokesman for the Bexar County sheriff's office, said at this time they are not naming suspects. It's not clear whether the district attorney will pursue the charges, which include misdemeanor and felony counts of unlawful restraint, according to the sheriff's office.
The Republican governors of Texas and Arizona have previously sent thousands of migrants on buses to New York, Chicago and Washington, D.C., but the rare charter flights by DeSantis mark an escalation in tactics. The two groups sent to Sacramento never went through Florida. Instead, they were approached in El Paso by people with Florida-linked paperwork, sent to New Mexico, then put on the private flights to California's capital, California officials and advocates said.
DeSantis, who is seeking the Republican nomination to run for president, has been a fierce critic of federal immigration policy under President Joe Biden and has heavily publicized Florida's role in past instances in which migrants were transported to Democratic-led states.
He has made the migrant relocation program one of his signature political priorities, using the state legislative process to direct millions of dollars to it and working with multiple contractors to carry out the flights.
SACRAMENTO RESPONDS
In Sacramento, the flight that arrived Monday with about 20 migrants followed the arrival Friday of 16 others from Colombia and Venezuela.
The newest arrivals remained at the airport for a couple of hours and were fed before being transported to a "religious institution," said Kim Nava, a Sacramento County spokeswoman. Nava said she didn't know the nationalities of the new arrivals or where they had intended to go in the U.S.
"Our county social workers are en route and are going to assess all those folks, make sure they have the services and support that they need," Nava said.
The first group of migrants was dropped off at the Roman Catholic Church diocese's headquarters in Sacramento. The migrants remained in a Sacramento hotel as of Monday, according to PICO California, a faith-based group that helps migrants.
Speaking over the weekend about the first group to arrive in Sacramento, Eddie Carmona, campaign director at PICO California, said U.S. immigration officials had already processed the young women and men and given them court dates for their asylum cases when "individuals representing a private contractor" approached them outside a migrant center in El Paso, Texas, and offered to help them get jobs and get them to their final destinations.
"They were lied to and intentionally deceived," Carmona said, adding that the migrants had no idea where they were after being dropped off in Sacramento. He said they have court dates in cities throughout the country and that none of them meant to end up in California.
Asylum-seekers can change the location of their court appearances, but many are reluctant to try and instead prefer sticking with a firm date, at least for their initial appearances. They figure it is a guarantee, even if horribly inconvenient.
The office of New Mexico Democratic Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham had no specifics as to why the immigrants were taken from Texas to New Mexico before being flown to California.
"Gov. Lujan Grisham stresses, yet again, the urgent need for comprehensive, thoughtful federal immigration reform which is rooted in a humanitarian response that keeps border communities in mind," the governor's spokesperson, Caroline Sweeney, said Monday.
Last year, DeSantis directed Republican lawmakers in Florida to create a program in his office dedicated to migrant relocations. It specified that the state could transport migrants from locations anywhere in the country. The law was designed to get around questions about the legality of transporting people on a flight that originated in Texas.
Florida's alleged role in the arrival of the two groups in Sacramento is sure to escalate the political feud between DeSantis and Newsom, who have offered conflicting visions on immigration, abortion and a host of other issues.
Information for this article was contributed by Tran Nguyen, Olga R. Rodriguez, Anthony Izaguirre, Paul J. Weber, Susan Montoya Bryan and Elliot Spagat of The Associated Press and by Maggie Angst and Mathew Miranda of The Sacramento Bee (TNS).
The Roman Catholic Diocese of Sacramento is seen in Sacramento, Calif., Monday, June 5, 2023. Sixteen migrants from Venezuela and Colombia were brought to the diocese's offices on Friday, June 2, 2023, after being flown from Texas to Sacramento. (AP Photo/Tran Nguyen)
FILE - California Attorney General Rob Bonta speaks at a news conference at the Capitol in Sacramento, Calif., Feb. 23, 2022. California's attorney general says the state of Florida appears to have arranged for a group of South American migrants to be dropped off outside a Sacramento church. Bonta said Saturday, June 3, 2023 the individuals had documents purporting to be from the Florida state government. (AP Photo/Rich Pedroncelli, File)