DeSantis Poaching Migrants from Texas
to Milk Busing Furor that Abbott Owned

Capitol Inside
September 17, 2022

Governor Greg Abbott has appeared to be increasingly worried about his re-election bid with Democrat Beto O'Rourke as his chief foe at the ballot box this fall. But Abbott faces a new and more sensational threat on the far right with Florida Governor Ron DeSantis trying to steal his thunder by poaching migrants for airplane rides to the island resort town where Stephen Spielberg made the movie Jaws.

The leader of the Sunshine State may be no match for his Texas counterpart in the art of the publicity stunt. Abbott has no rivals when it comes to making creative splashes with maximum shock value to tout on Fox News. But DeSantis gave it his best shot nonetheless this week when his camp rounded up 50 migrants from Venezuela and other countries in San Antonio for trips to Boston that actually ended 90 miles away in Martha's Vineyard.

Abbott found a way to make national news on a daily basis by busing more than 10,000 migrants to New York City, Washington D.C. and Chicago during the spring and summer. Abbott's buses were old news - however - when DeSantis pulled off an epic spotlight grab with a slick con that relied on a mysterious female character named Perla to recruit asylum seekers for the flights to the Cradle of Liberty with cash payments and promises of jobs that never materialized as bait.

DeSantis managed to upstage Abbott in one fell swoop after his team seduced dozens of migrants who would have been candidates for cross-country excursions on Texas charters and subsequent statistics for the Abbott resume. Instead of calling DeSantis out for mooching on a controversy that Abbott ignited and cultivated for months, the Texas governor's office chose to make nice in a statement on Friday.

“Though we were not involved in these initial planes to Martha’s Vineyard, we appreciate the support in responding to this national crisis and helping Texans,” Abbott press secretary Renae Eze said.

Abbott has been called every name in the book and worse by the mayors of the major American cities that he's flooded with migrants and Democratic governors in their states as well. But DeSantis hasn't encountered any resistance from one of the few Republicans in Massachusetts - Governor Charlie Baker - or his Democratic general election foe Maura Healey. Baker has taken the exportation of migrants from Texas to his state seriously - scrambling to ensure that they'd receive proper treatment as they begin the process of apply for asylum in the U.S. Abbott always looks concerned to the point of potential panic when speaking rapidly in interviews on Fox News and other outlets.

DeSantis is the only one in the bunch that seems to be having any fun with the shuffling of migrants around the country to make political points for re-election campaigns. DeSantis served up a personal insult as a joke on Friday when asked about California Governor Gavin Newsom's request for a federal investigation into the migrant hijacking and hoodwinking in Texas.

"So the Governor of California sent a letter to the Department of Justice saying, ‘You need to prosecute Texas and Florida Governors.’ And all I can say is, I think his hair gel is interfering with his brain function," DeSantis said in a briefing with reporters.

The Abbott migrant busing plan has been tantamount to a bucket for a tidal wave that the Republicans are trying to defuse in a fight they have no chance to win. But Abbott has sought to justify the migrant busing plan with assertions that it's eased the strain for communities on or near the border in the midst of a surge that's been under way for a year or more. The Texas governor has plenty of local officials in rural areas that will be back him up on that.

DeSantis had to manufacture a border crisis before he could sink his teeth into it ala Abbott. DeSantis had the migrants who bought the snake oil from Perla flown from the Alamo City to Martha's Vineyard with a stop in Florida as an apparent legal technicality for his defense. DeSantis said he had the authority for the migrant import and export maneuver with a new state budget provision that freed up $12 million for the transportation of migrants out of Florida.

The law apparently doesn't forbid Florida officials like DeSantis from conducting migrant roundups in other states as hooks for the appropriation. But such an expenditure would be an investment with no potential return for the state of Florida or the people there if it was used to create a problem that it was approved to prevent.

One of the more mind-boggling aspects of the DeSantis' elevation of himself into the immigration debate is the fact that he'd been doing just fine without the need for that. DeSantis is the consensus heir apparent to Donald Trump in the throne at the GOP. DeSantis was tied with Trump on Saturday as the candidates with the highest odds to win the 2024 presidential election on the gambling platform Bovada.

Abbott is tied for 41st in the Bovada rankings of potential presidential contenders in a group of six that includes former Trump press secretary Kayleigh McEnany and a pair of Democrats in Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer and former New York Governor Andrew Cuomo. Abbott's chief foe this fall - Democrat Beto O'Rourke - is 10th overall in the 2024 White House sweepstakes odds on Bovada with odds that are three times higher than the incumbent governor who's a substantial favorite in their bout.

But Abbott is all in on the competition with DeSantis for migrant transport publicity points - having shipped the second busload to Vice-President Kamala Harris' residence in Washington D.C. in the past two days since the Florida governor's oneupmanship bid by air.