Florida authorities are preparing for an “armada” of refugees from Haiti, as the humanitarian crisis in a nation just 800 miles from American shores grows “far worse” than ever before, a former American ambassador to Port-au-Prince warns. 

To respond to vessels coming from Haiti, Governor Desantis is directing Florida’s Division of Emergency Management, the State Guard, and state law enforcement agencies to deploy more than 250 additional officers and soldiers and more than a dozen air and sea craft to the southern coast of Florida. Mr. Desantis wrote on X Wednesday: “We cannot have illegal aliens coming to Florida.”

Without intervention from American authorities, there will be an “armada” of people heading north from Haiti, the former U.S. ambassador to Haiti, Raymond Joseph, tells the Sun. “A lot of them will die at sea, but they’re still taking their chances.”

Department of Defense officials confirmed before the House Armed Services Committee on Tuesday that though they have not yet seen large enough numbers to characterize a mass maritime migration, deteriorating conditions in Haiti could lead to that situation. 

Mr. Joseph says the migration out of Haiti today is “far worse” than the past instances of forced migration from the Caribbean to America by sea. There was the Cuban rafter crisis of 1994, in which tens of thousands of Cubans fled the island by boat and raft for Florida, and the Haitian refugee crisis of the early 1990s, which saw the U.S. Coast Guard taking Haitian refugees to a camp at Guantanamo Bay.

“Back then, it was mainly a political situation, but today it’s a humanitarian situation,” Mr. Joseph says. “It’s a whole country that is running away from gangs.” Nearly all foreign envoys have fled Haiti, with the U.S. military airlifting American personnel at the embassy at Port-au-Prince as violence escalates throughout the country.

The coast guard at St. Petersburg, Florida, repatriated 65 migrants to Haiti on Tuesday, “following an interdiction of a migrant venture near Great Inagua, Bahamas,” according to a statement. The coast guard and the southeast partners of the Homeland Security Task Force said they will continue to detect and deter attempts to enter the United States unlawfully across the Florida Straits and the Caribbean Sea. 

“Every time Haiti has problems, the Bahamas and the U.S. get the refugees,” Mr. Joseph says. The Dominican Republic, which shares the island of Hispaniola with Haiti, is not as much of a destination for refugees due to tenser relations and a tighter border. Fleeing by boat is the best bet for Haitians, Mr. Joseph says, “otherwise they stay and be killed. It’s awful, it’s awful, it’s awful.”

Congressman Matt Gaetz proposed at the Tuesday hearing an executive order, previously signed by President George W. Bush, that enables presidents to deploy naval vessels that can repatriate individuals before reaching America’s shore, deterring mass migration. He said he was “deeply concerned about this wave of people,” which he says does not disperse throughout the country but stays in Southeast Florida.