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Delaware officials and the White House said they are monitoring for the potential arrival of planes of migrants and illegal immigrants expected from Florida and/or Texas on Tuesday.
“We’re aware of the reports and continue to prepare for the possibility of migrants arriving in Delaware unannounced,” Democratic Gov. John Carney’s director of communications, Emily Hershman, told Fox News Digital. “Our teams at [Delaware Emergency Management Agency] and [Delaware Department of Health and Social Services] are working with community organizations and other partners to make sure that migrants who arrive here have the support that they need.”
White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre also acknowledged the reports.
“Yes, we’ve … we have received word of the flights. And, yes, we are coordinating closely with state officials and local service providers who are prepared to welcome these families in an orderly manner as they pursue their asylum claims,” Jean-Pierre told reporters.
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President Biden rides a bike through Gordon’s Pond State Park in Rehoboth Beach, Delaware on July 10, 2022. (NICHOLAS KAMM/AFP)
The News Journal, based in Wilmington, Delaware, reported that the governor’s office and community groups were mobilizing to Georgetown, Delaware, for the possible arrival of migrants at Delaware Coastal Airport. According to the newspaper, at least one plane was expected to take off from Texas and stop over at Bob Sikes Airport in Crestview, Florida, before heading to Delaware on Tuesday afternoon.
It’s unclear if the plane has yet departed Texas on Tuesday or if a second plane already made it to Florida Monday night. Fox News Digital also reached out to Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis and Texas Gov. Greg Abbott’s offices for comment.
At a press conference on Tuesday, DeSantis would not confirm he was sending a plane to Delaware. A reporter is heard saying, “Public records show that Florida is sending a million dollar – sending a plane right now, from Texas to Delaware. First, can you confirm that?”
Delaware Gov. John C Carney Jr. speaks at the Delaware Memorial Day Ceremony, in New Castle on May 30, 2019. (Bastiaan Slabbers/NurPhoto via Getty Images)
“I cannot confirm that. I can’t,” DeSantis said, adding though, that intelligence shows between a third to 40% of migrants crossing the southern border illegally are seeking to end up in Florida. “If you can do it at the source and divert to sanctuary jurisdictions, the chance they end up in Florida is much less.”
Abbott has been busing migrants from the southern border to so-called “sanctuary” destinations for the past several months.
Groups of migrants wait outside the Migrant Resource Center to receive food from the San Antonio Catholic Charities on September 19, 2022 in San Antonio, Texas. The City of San Antonio Migrant Resource Center is the place of origin of the two planeloads of mostly Venezuelan migrants who were sent via Florida to Martha’s Vineyard in Massachusetts by Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis. (Jordan Vonderhaar/Getty Images)
Texas has sent at least 8,000 migrants to Washington, D.C., since April and more than 2,500 migrants to New York City since August 5, according to the Texas governor’s office’s latest figures. More than 600 migrants from Texas have arrived in Chicago since late August.
Meanwhile, DeSantis joined the effort to shed light on the Biden administration’s inaction on the immigration crisis last week by flying 48 illegal immigrants from Venezuela to the ritzy Massachusetts’ island of Martha’s Vineyard.
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Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, tweeted that Rehoboth Beach, Delaware — where Biden has a vacation home — should be next, tagging both Abbott and DeSantis.
Fox News’ Adam Shaw contributed to this report.
