Florida Republicans Want Answers From Pete Buttigieg on DOT's Use of Nation's Airports to House Illegal Immigrants”

Last week, six Republicans representing Florida in the U.S. House–U.S. Reps. Aaron Bean, Kat Cammack, Byron Donalds, Neal Dunn, Scott Franklin and Dan Webster–joined more than 60 fellow House Republicans in a letter to U.S. Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg opposing the Biden administration’s “allowance and encouragement of the use of airports throughout the nation as temporary shelters for illegal immigrants.”

Members cited reports in the letter that the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has proposed housing 60,000 migrants at four public airports and other facilities in New York and New Jersey, as has been done at Chicago O’Hare International Airport.

“We adamantly oppose these ill-conceived plans that blatantly ignore the true crisis at hand and would inappropriately utilize America’s infrastructure,” the members wrote. “Our Nation’s airport infrastructure was built to facilitate commerce and transportation, not to serve as housing for unvetted and undocumented migrants. We request that you enforce public airport grant assurances and reject such plans.

“The Biden-Harris Administration’s abject failure to protect our border or support policies that will keep America secure is an unconscionable dereliction of the most fundamental duty the Federal Government has to the citizens of this country,” they added.