MARTHA'S VINEYARD, Mass. — Nearly a month after public records requests were submitted for any and all documented material about Florida’s controversial migrant flights to Martha’s Vineyard last month, the Gov. Ron DeSantis' public records office and Florida’s Department of Transportation (FDOT) made dozens of records public.

The records, which still don’t include detailed contracts, spell out guidelines for the governor’s controversial migrant relocation program and include quotes from three companies who, over the summer, made a play for the gig.

According to the state’s requests for quotes, the state sought services from a “transportation management company to implement and manage a program to relocate out of the state of Florida foreign nationals who are not lawfully present in the United States.”

But that’s not what happened last month when two flights picked up nearly 50 asylum-seeking Venezuelans in Texas and then brought them to Martha’s Vineyard on Florida’s dime.

Records show the flight made a brief stop in Crestview, FL, on the way to Martha’s Vineyard, but none of the passengers got off the plane.

“We take what’s going at the southern border very seriously,” said DeSantis, shortly after news of the flights swiftly attracted international attention.

DeSantis wasted no time taking credit for the flights and even revealed his plan to pay for more as a way to open America’s eyes to the border crisis.

“I got $12 million for us to use, and we’re going to use it, and you’re going to see more and more. I’m going to make sure that we exhaust all those funds,” said DeSantis, who continues to double down on the use of $12 million in state funds from interest earned on pandemic relief dollars for the state’s new migrant relocation program.

Ray Ewing/AP

DeSantis said the program is his way of combating what he’s described as Biden’s border crisis.

State records also now confirm Vertol Systems Inc, an aviation company based in Destin, provided the chartered flights from Texas to Martha’s Vineyard.

About a week before the flights, Vertol’s CEO, James Montgomerie, sent a memo to FDOT detailing his offer for “the ongoing delivery of these services… on an ongoing month-to-month basis.”

In the memo, Montgomerie added, this “first project shall involve the facilitation of the relocation of up to fifty individuals to the state of Massachusetts or other proximate northeastern state designated by FDOT.”

Vertol’s price for project one— $615,000. Two days later, Florida paid Vertol that exact amount. The company has received another $950,000, though it’s unclear for what since additional records have yet to be made public.

“If you draft your own law and can’t follow it within a few months, that’s a problem,” said Florida State Senator Jason Pizzo of Miami in response to the records.

Last month, Pizzo filed a lawsuit against DeSantis, asking a Judge to ban the administration from using state money to relocate migrants who aren’t even in Florida.

When asked if these recently released state documents prove the administration went outside the scope of its own rules, Pizzo responded, “I think it's pretty clear that someone went back and read what the actual law was, after all of the attention, and will have a difficult time trying to explain their way out of it,” he said.

As for Vertol Systems Inc, its website was taken down after the flights made national headlines. Its CEO, James Montgomerie, has not answered our calls or responded to our multiple messages.

For now, Montgomerie’s only public comments on the flights stem from state records, which primarily discuss money and logistics but end like this, “We welcome the opportunity to support your mission.”

On Monday, the Florida Center for Accountability filed a lawsuit in Leon County alleging the governor’s office did not comply with requests to release all records pertaining to these flights. The governor’s office has said this is the first production of records.

This article was written by Katie LaGrone for WFTS.

SANIBEL ISLAND, Fla. (WFTS) — Wednesday marked a significant sign of progress three weeks after Hurricane Ian made landfall in Southwest Florida and carved a path of destruction many still struggle to comprehend.

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis announced the Sanibel Causeway would reopen on Wednesday, 10 days ahead of schedule.

The causeway had been restricted to power crews and first responders in recent days but is now reopened to all people living on Sanibel.

Anne-Marie Bouche, an art history professor at Florida Gulf Coast University, opened the door to her home for the first time since Hurricane Ian to discover what, if anything, was spared.

“I lay in bed, and I was dreading getting into the house because I knew it was going to be a shock. I woke up, and I was shivering thinking about it. But it is what it is, and there are people who are worse off, and I keep trying to remember that. There are people who are worse off," Bouche said.

Bouche said she would retire at the end of the year, but even before seeing the damage, she knew that after Ian, she would now need to keep working. She said she's grateful that's even an option.

"I can keep working, which is a blessing," Bouche said.

Off the coast of Ft. Myers Beach, one of the hardest hit areas, Captain Geoff Crouse said seeing the level of devastation is still surreal.

“The human mind is an interesting thing. It’ll block out really bad, so you can deal with it," Crouse said. "That’s kind of the way I feel right now, is it’s blocking out the bad. Just to be able to deal with it and help people out."

Crouse has been making trips daily to Sanibel Island for people to get eyes on their properties and assess not only the physical damage — but take in the emotional toll of what was lost and what survived Hurricane Ian.

Coming up on Sanibel Island, the lighthouse still stands tall, spared from the erosion that swallowed all that once stood before it. More than a landmark, it provided a beacon of hope for Bouche.

Stepping onto the island and off the boat, Bouche entered a world much different than the one she evacuated.

Some roads were flooded. Power lines were torn down. Homes were gutted onto the curb, with pictures, Christmas decorations and toys, lining quiet roads. The quiet was broken only by the low hum of a generator, birds chirping, or the occasional sound of more debris being tossed into a heap of junk that once helped make the house a home.

The walk to Bouche's home was more than two miles. A familiar trip home, calling out directions of where to drag two wagons next, to rescue what she could from inside, was muddied with an uneasiness about what the journey would reveal at every turn.

On the walk home, Bouche met a man who motioned with his hands and said the water "only got about here, but I mean, if you're on the ground level..."

"I am on the ground level," Bouche said.

"Sorry," the man said, as she walked off and said, "It's bad."

Coming up to the entrance of her neighborhood, Gumbo Limbo, she noticed new leaves coming in on the tree her neighborhood is named after.

“Everything was wiped out by the hurricane, and it’s two weeks later, and it’s already starting to grow again," Bouche said, pointing to the leaves.

That hope carried her in the final steps up to her home.

Walking up her driveway, covered in tree limbs, climbing over a tree, knocked down in front of her door; she put in the key and turned the lock to the front door.

"Oh my God, it’s not that bad. It’s not that bad! I can’t believe it! It’s not that bad. It didn’t get that high," Bouche said, the smell of mold, immediate. “Gosh, it only went up like three feet."

Bouche said she was expecting worse.

"Oh, it could have been so much worse. It could have been so much worse. I feel like I have to thank God because this is really amazing," Bouche said, standing in mud in her kitchen, with the ceiling hanging down. “I mean, yes, there’s a lot of mess, a lot to clean up, but this is fixable.” 

The family heirlooms, her family's history — safe.

“Oh, they’re clean! The back is clean," Bouche said, checking the back of two portraits hanging on the wall for mold.

“This is my father’s great-grandfather," she said, pointing to one of the paintings. “These paintings date from, you know, middle of the 19th century.”

“This one is my father’s grandmother," she said, pointing to another.

Ahead of the visit, Bouche had talked about her father's safe and the hope to get it open before it rusted shut. Pulling out an antique key, she held her breath.

It opened.

“It’s been on my mind because this was my father’s favorite possession. And he loved this safe. It was his father’s office safe," she said. “From the late 18th, early 19th century.”

The trip home, Bouche said, left her feeling optimistic.

“I know this community is very resilient. I know it’s going to come back," Bouche said.

Pulling away from land, away from the Sanibel Lighthouse, Bouche smiled.

This story was originally reported by Kylie McGivern on abcactionnews.com.

POLK COUNTY, Fla. — Just days before a verdict is expected in the high profile Derek Chauvin case, Florida leaders want to make sure any demonstrations in the Sunshine State don't get out of hand.

Gov. Ron DeSantis on Monday signed the so-called "anti-riot" bill into law, which places tougher penalties on protesters who engage in violent rallies.

"We're not gonna let the mob win the day," DeSantis said during a news conference in Polk County, calling the plan the "strongest anti-rioting" legislation in the country.

"The state of Florida takes public safety very seriously," he said.

WATCH NEWS CONFERENCE:

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis signs 'anti-riot' bill into law

The measure was first proposed by the governor last year following violent Black Lives Matter protests after Chauvin, then a police officer, killed Minnesota resident George Floyd by kneeling on his neck for more than eight minutes.

The new law, which takes effect immediately, punishes protesters who take part in violent and disorderly demonstrations in Florida.

"If you riot, if you loot, if you harm others, particularly if you harm a law enforcement officer during one of these violent assemblies, you're going to jail," DeSantis said.

In addition, the law penalizes protesters who commandeer highways -- like we saw in May of 2020 in West Palm Beach -- topple monuments, or those who take part in "mob intimidation" by accosting the public.

It also allows local police agencies to challenge budgets, prevents local governments from defunding law enforcement agencies, and opens cities up to liability for poor riot control.

"If you're derelict in your duty as a local government, if you tell law enforcement to stand down, then you're responsible for the damage that ensues," DeSantis said. "And if someone's been harmed or their property has been destroyed, then they can sue you for compensation."

Democrats are staunchly opposed to the bill, worried its broad language will suppress nonviolent demonstrations and minority voices.

Following DeSantis' news conference on Monday, Florida Agriculture Commissioner Nikki Fried -- who appears to be eyeing a run for governor in 2022 -- released the following statement:

However, Republican leaders said they still encourage calm demonstrations.

"You can peacefully protest every day, and should peacefully protest if you feel like that's necessary," said Florida Senate President Wilton Simpson. "But if you cross the line and you start damaging property, you start threatening law enforcement, then this law is going to have the enhanced penalties that exist here."

Closing arguments started Monday in the Chauvin case. The former Minneapolis police officer is charged with second and third-degree murder in connection with the death of Floyd last May.

Floyd’s death and bystander video of his arrest sparked months of protests against police brutality and racial injustice throughout the country.

This story was originally published by Matt Papaycik and Victoria Lewis at WPTV.

TAMPA, Fla. — The Computer and Communications Industry Association (CCIA), which counts Amazon, eBay, Google, Facebook, Intel and Twitter as members, have co-filed a lawsuit in a Florida federal court against Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis’ new social media law.

Florida’s law came after months of complaints from conservatives about the suspension of former President Donald Trump’s accounts on Twitter, Facebook and other websites following the Jan. 6 riots at the U.S. Capitol.

The CCIA co-filed the suit with NetChoice. The groups said Florida’s law, the “Stop Social Media Censorship Act,” would “open digital services that allow third-party content to lawsuits when they enforce terms or policies designed to keep users safe” and that it violated the First and Fourteenth Amendments to the U.S. Constitution.

Specifically, the lawsuit said Florida's social media law, "infringes on the rights to freedom of speech, equal protection, and due process protected by the First and Fourteenth Amendments to the U.S. Constitution."

"The Act is a frontal assault on the First Amendment and an extraordinary intervention by the government in the free marketplace of ideas that would be unthinkable for traditional media, booksellers, lending libraries, or newsstands," the lawsuit reads, adding that it's "so rife with fundamental infirmities that it appears to have been enacted without any regard for the Constitution."

Social media sites like Twitter and YouTube have said Trump and has been blocked from the websites for violating their rules and terms of service. Facebook's Oversight Board, an independent group that presides over content moderation appeals, has asked that social media group to further clarify Trump's current indefinite suspension.

Matt Schurers, president of the CCIA said Florida's law is "more characteristic of last-century dictatorships than 21st-century democracies.”

For his part, DeSantis blasted “Silicon Valley elites” in a statement when he signed the law.

“This session, we took action to ensure that ‘We the People’ — real Floridians across the Sunshine State — are guaranteed protection against the Silicon Valley elites,” DeSantis said at the time. “Many in our state have experienced censorship and other tyrannical behavior firsthand in Cuba and Venezuela. If 'Big Tech' censors enforce rules inconsistently, to discriminate in favor of the dominant Silicon Valley ideology, they will now be held accountable.”

In addition to the constitutional challenges, the lawsuit challenged the law under the recently controversial Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act. The suit said the new social media law, "exceeds the State of Florida's authority under the Constitution's Commerce Clause and is preempted by Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act."

Read the full lawsuit below:

This story was originally published by Tim Kephart on Scripps station WFTS in Tampa, Florida.