Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier on Thursday announced the arrests of six non-citizen criminals engaging in mass car theft, whom he says are the product of former President Joe Biden's border policy.
The five people in custody, and one who's at large, have been involved in a "very large" theft ring of rental vehicles, Uthmeier said at a Tampa press conference Thursday. He declined to comment on how many of the six are in the country illegally versus how many are legally present but not citizens, though Uthmeier speculated it was a combination of both.
The arrests follow Gov. Ron DeSantis's efforts to align state and local law enforcement with federal immigration policy, making Florida the first state in the nation to have all county sheriffs enter into an agreement to assist Immigration and Customs Enforcement with the deportation of illegal immigrants.
"You've got six criminals here, not one of them a U.S. citizen," Uthmeier said. "This shows the dangers that have resulted from the Biden reckless border policy."
The case has gone back as far as June 2022 and began in the Fort Myers region before moving into Tampa, Florida Department of Law Enforcement Mark Glass revealed alongside Uthmeier. Over the two years, the theft ring's tactics evolved from just stealing rented cars from airports to renting a car from an airport or small dealership, cloning the key, installing either an Apple Airtag or Samsung Smartag, and then waiting upwards of a month to steal it.
They'd wipe the car's identifying information, sometimes with the fraudulent help of small dealerships, and sell it to Floridians—cash only. 81 cars, mostly high-end SUVs like Escalades and Rolls Royces, and mostly rentals, were stolen. FDLE estimates that the ring took upwards of a million dollars, but they "can't find the cash."
But Uthmeier remains confident that FDLE can locate the money and capture the sixth thief "at large." He lauded law enforcement's efforts, noting that DeSantis has asked for their pay hikes in his budget proposal, before praising the governor for his anti-illegal immigration efforts.
"We've got a great governor who backs our law enforcement and who makes sure that our communities are gonna be safe," said Uthmeier, DeSantis's former Chief of Staff until the governor appointed him to the Attorney General role in January. He succeeded Ashley Moody, who was appointed to Marco Rubio's Senate seat once President Donald Trump nominated him for the Secretary of State position.
DeSantis and the GOP-led Legislature engaged in a month-long battle over illegal immigration, involving three special sessions and 11 killed bills. After conservatives' rare revolt against the governor, the two powerhouses compromised in a third special session with a sweeping law imposing the death penalty for illegal immigrants convicted of capital crimes, creating state-level crimes for illegally entering Florida, and nixing in-state tuition rates for undocumented college students.
