The White House has denounced Florida Governor Ron DeSantis and Texas Governor Greg Abbott for busing and flying asylum seekers to liberal states. This is White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre.

Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre: “They use them as political pawns, treated them like chattel in a cruel, premeditated political stunt.”

The White House criticism came after Florida Governor Ron DeSantis flew 50 Venezuelan asylum seekers to Martha’s Vineyard, an island off the coast of Massachusetts. Authorities in Massachusetts have since moved the asylum seekers to a military base in nearby Cape Cod. On Friday, Massachusetts Senator Ed Markey and six members of the state’s congressional delegation called on the Treasury Department to investigate DeSantis for using federal COVID-19 relief funds to fly the asylum seekers to Martha’s Vineyard. Domingo Garcia, president of LULAC, the League of United Latin American Citizens, denounced the Republican effort to send asylum seekers to Martha’s Vineyard, New York City and Washington, D.C.

Domingo Garcia: “I was in Washington yesterday, in Washington, D.C., and we had one immigrant who went into shock because he was diabetic and his insulin hadn’t been refrigerated. He had to go to the hospital. We heard that there was a baby that also went to the hospital. They’ll have respiratory issues, because they had been on a bus for 16 hours, you know? Again, these were just — it is un-Christian, un-American and un-Texan to use immigrants this way, fellow refugees.”