A group of migrants huddle on a sidewalk in front of St. Andrews Episcopal Church in Martha’s Vineyard.
Jonathan Wiggs/The Boston Globe via Getty Images
Two lawmakers say they’ve gotten death threats over their support of the migrants flown to Martha’s Vineyard.
“You should see my inbox right now and how ugly it is,” Massachusetts State Rep. Dylan Fernandes said.
Last week, 50 migrants were flown to Martha’s Vineyard in a move planned by Florida Gov. DeSantis.
Two Democratic Massachusetts state lawmakers representing the island of Martha’s Vineyard say they’ve gotten death threats as a result of their support for the migrants who were flown to the coastal enclave by Republican Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis.
State Rep. Dylan Fernandes and State Sen. Julian Cyr said they received the threats after coming to the aid of the roughly 50 migrants from Venezuela who were brought to Martha’s Vineyard from Texas unannounced last week.
“You should see my inbox right now and how ugly it is,” Fernandes told WGBH’s Greater Boston on Thursday, adding that Massachusetts State Police has been notified of the situation.
“My poor staff has had to listen to voicemails, and we’ve had to alert the state police of death threats, and you know, I’m getting stuff all the time,” he said.
The legislator said that the hateful messages he has gotten speak “to the nature of where we are at in this country where treating human beings with dignity is a controversial thing.”
“I mean it is mind-blowing to me that any human being could be this depraved to think this is an acceptable thing to do — to use women and children as political pawns,” Fernandes said.
Cyr was quoted by Axios saying that he’s taking the backlash he has gotten over his advocacy for the migrants “in stride.”
“I try to stay focused on my constituents on responding, on making sure these Venezuelan immigrants are treated with dignity and respect,” Cyr said, according to Axios.
A spokesperson for the state senator told Insider on Tuesday that she was aware of at least one death threat against Cyr.
Last week, DeSantis sparked a firestorm of criticism after he had the migrants flown to Martha’s Vineyard on two chartered planes in what attorneys for the immigrants called a “shameful political stunt.”
A group of the migrants on Tuesday filed a federal class action suit against DeSantis and other state officials, alleging that they carried out a “scheme to defraud vulnerable immigrants to advance a political motive.”
Lawyers representing a majority of the migrants have called on state and federal prosecutors to open a criminal probe into the situation.
The immigrants have since been relocated to a military base in Cape Cod, Massachusetts.
Fernandes told WGBH’s Greater Boston that the threats he’s gotten “is nothing compared to what these people have gone through.”
“Some have walked 60 days just to get to the border followed by gang violence, some were robbed, others were physically harmed,” said the lawmaker. “Don’t worry about my voicemail — what does matter is the incredible plight these people have gone through.”
“And once they finally got here after going through all of that they weren’t met with human decency, they were met with a lie and shipped off and used,” he said. “We’re going to treat people like human beings here.”