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| Photo Credit: AP. |
A Texas sheriff has declared that illegal migrants recently flown to Martha’s Vineyard were crime victims, clearing the way for them to obtain special visas to stay in the United States.
Bexar County
Sheriff Javier Salazar said he had filed certification forms so that
immigration lawyers can bolster their arguments for keeping dozens of migrants
mostly from Venezuela in the country, The Washington Times reports. The sheriff
noted that the migrants were duped by Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, a Republican,
at the time they were flown to the Democrats stronghold in Massachusetts.
“Based upon
the claims of migrants being transported from Bexar County under false
pretenses, we are investigating this case as possible Unlawful Restraint,”
Sheriff Salazar said in a statement, according to The Washington Times. “We
have submitted documentation through the federal system to ensure the migrants’
availability as witnesses during the investigation.”
The Washington
Times reported that the migrants are seeking U-1 nonimmigrant visas, or U
Visas, that are usually given to victims of certain crimes who suffer mental or
physical abuse or can help law enforcement investigate crimes
Sheriff
Salazar, who is a Democrat, has opened an investigation into the DeSantis
flights, alleging that they were flown from Texas to Florida and then
Massachusetts under false pretenses.
Mr. DeSantis
has however dismissed the allegations noting that migrants signed waivers and
maintained that sanctuary cities mostly run by Democrats should share in the
pain of President Joe Biden’s chaotic open border policy.
Texas Gov.
Greg Abbott and DeSantis have been busing groups of undocumented migrants to
cities mostly governed by Democrats in a bid to register their displeasure with
the Biden administration’s immigration policies.
In September
DeSantis sent planeloads of illegal migrants to the wealthy Martha’s Vineyard,
a day later Abbott sent busloads of migrants to Vice President Kamala Harris’s
home in Washington, D.C.
White House
Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre described the transportation of migrants in
September as “a cruel political game, a cruel political stunt with migrants and
families and children who are fleeing communism?"
Texas and
Arizona have sent thousands of migrants to Washington D.C. and New York after
President Joe Biden announced in April he was suspending former President
Donald Trump’s freeze on immigration along the U.S.- Mexico border to halt the
spread of COVID-19.