Gov. Ron DeSantis, R-Fla., during a Monday roundtable discussion with faith leaders and Cuban Americans denounced Biden’s border policies saying they have led to “more human trafficking, more sex trafficking, and more drug trafficking.”
The governor remarked that the country would have avoided these serious issues if President Donald Trump’s policies were still in place.
“If you did the policies that the Trump administration had and the policies that Florida’s supporting, we would have less human trafficking, less sex trafficking, and of course less drug trafficking. And so that would be better for the victims that are coming through with the cartels,” DeSantis said Monday.
He added that the policies would “also be better for the victims in our own country…who are having to deal with drugs in their communities like we’ve never seen.”
DeSantis argued the “failed border policies” pushed by the Biden administration are “endangering migrant children” through human trafficking. Substantiating this claim, the Department of Homeland Security recently reported that human trafficking increased by 35 percent in fiscal year 2021.
The governor, followed by multiple individuals at the roundtable, discredited the Biden administration’s comparison of the current border situation to Pedro Pan, a program where minors were legally flown to the United States from Cuba in hopes of escaping the communist regime under Castro.
Maximo Alvarez, an advocate of legal immigration who took part in the program, reiterated DeSantis’ sentiments. “They are trying to use this program to try to convince people that this is similar to what is happening today – not even close,” he said.
DeSantis has continually raised alarms about Biden’s unnerving border policies that have affected Florida. One of those is the administration’s secret overnight flights carrying illegal immigrants to various destinations in the Sunshine State.
“They’ve done over 70 flights in the last six months, dump people here,” DeSantis said in December. “And we had—a few weeks ago—one of those people that Biden dumped, ended up committing a murder in northeast Florida. So, these are crimes that would not have happened but for Biden’s recklessness.”
To fight Biden’s immigration policies, the governor proposed a new program allocating $8 million in federal funding to remove illegal immigrants dumped in the state by the federal government.
DeSantis also vowed to deny state license renewal for any Florida Department of Children and Families facility caught housing illegal migrant children that are flown to the Sunshine State.