Florida’s $406M immigration tab includes private jet flights and a Margaritaville hotel

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The Florida House wants to prevent the state’s disaster response agency from using emergency funds on immigration or any non-natural disaster.

The lower chamber — long at odds with the DeSantis administration — would also ban the purchase of aircraft, boats, or motor vehicles through the Emergency Preparedness and Response Fund, a trust set to expire next week unless reauthorized by the Legislature.

The GOP-supermajority House’s decision to limit the governor’s power comes just days after reports that the Florida Division of Emergency Management (FDEM) spent $573 million of the fund to fight illegal immigration since 2023. These were the first financials known about the fund in years.

FDEM spent more than 70% — $406 million — in six months, hundreds of thousands of which covered private jet flights, restaurant meals, and boats.

The Florida Phoenix reported this week that that figure also includes $354,000 that was spent in just four days, between Feb. 10 and 13. New billings in that period include a custom trailer business, a prison supply company, and a Margaritaville hotel, state spending records show.

Additional expenses in that period included three payments totaling $8,369.81 to Amazon Marketplace; $5,438.07 to Brimar Industries, manufacturer of safety signs and pipe markers; $606 to the Spirit Airlines Charitable Foundation; and $110 at the Compass by Margaritaville.

The three-page bill, a companion to the proposed state budget the House released Thursday evening, provides that only natural disasters — such as hurricanes, tornadoes, or floods — would be eligible for the emergency fund’s dollars.

The governor’s office would be responsible for a quarterly report on the trust’s financial health, and FDEM’s director would have to attest that it’s all accurate under penalty of perjury.

The measure would require that any federal reimbursements go to the Legislature’s General Revenue Fund, not the emergency fund. This proposed rule comes as state officials await a $608 million reimbursement from the Trump administration, but it’s been unclear whether those dollars would go straight into the emergency fund or to the Legislature.

It’s also unclear whether that reimbursement is coming at all. Florida officials have long claimed the federal dollars are on the way, but the Trump administration’s lawyers have argued that they never promised to pay back the state.

The bill is part of the House’s $113 billion proposed budget for the fiscal year beginning July 1, released Thursday evening. The proposal’s reveal came as a surprise to the Senate, which just hours earlier had postponed budget meetings scheduled for this week so it could publish its proposal at the same time as the House.

Although the Republican majorities in both chambers have disagreed on the emergency fund, the trust’s financial situation has left GOP representatives to align with Senate Democrats in hopes of limiting the fund’s bounds. On Wednesday, the Senate killed a Democratic amendment that would have limited fund spending to natural disasters.

Instead, the upper chamber voted to reauthorize the fund as is.

The House’s bill would appropriate $100 million to the fund, and set July 1, 2030, as its expiration date. The legislature has traditionally allocated $500 million a year to the trust.

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