While Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis’ decision to send 50 Venezuelan migrants from Texas to Martha’s Vineyard, Massachusetts, was praised by many in his party; it is now going to cost the Republican state millions in legal fees.
Florida has agreed to pay a maximum of $1 million to two law firms to represent and defend DeSantis and other state officials after a class action lawsuit was filed in Boston by a group of attorneys on behalf of the migrants.
Representing DeSantis are the firms Consovoy McCarthy, and Campbell Conroy & O’Neil, according to a report from Tallahassee.com. So far, $112,00 has been paid to each of the firms.
While the legal fees alone make the move from DeSantis pricey, the state has already paid upwards of $1.6 million to fly the migrants to their location. The payments were made to the Florida-based aviation firm Vertol Systems Company, the report said.
After all is said and done, the total costs come out to $35,000 for each migrant relocated from Texas.
Behind the lawsuit filed against DeSantis and other officials is Iván Espinoza-Madrigal, the executive director of the Boston nonprofit Lawyers for Civil Rights, Tallahassee.com reported.
The lawsuit, filed in September in Massachusetts’ federal court, accuses Florida of using the state’s “scarce taxpayer dollars” so that DeSantis could put on “immigration theater,” CNN reported.
“Florida's hard-working people are now on the hook for a million dollars for out-of-state lawyers to defend DeSantis' fraudulent scheme,” Espinoza-Madrigal said in a statement. “If you can't be fair, you should at least be frugal.”
Despite the fees accrued through DeSantis’ migrant relocation program, the governor has stood by his decision, calling it the “most effective” way to stop asylum seekers from coming to Florida.
He has even gone as far as to say finding migrants at the Texas border and relocating them is better than waiting for them to come to Florida.
In September, DeSantis bragged about the state’s Department of Transportation allotting him a large fund to run the program, WPTV reported at the time.
“I’ll tell you this, the Legislature gave me $12 million,” DeSantis said in September. “We’re going to spend every penny of that to make sure that we’re protecting the people of the state of Florida.”
It is unclear if any of the $12 million is being used for the legal fees.
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