Florida Rep. Anthony Sabatini (R-Howey-in-the-Hills) blasted “totally hypocritical” Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) for “abandoning her own people” for the “free” Sunshine State, comparing her to 20th century “corrupt communist leaders” who justified breaking their own rules, as he predicted migration to red states would continue and called on new Floridians to leave their “leftist-communist” views behind. 

Speaking with Breitbart News on Friday in light of recent census data indicating blue states have increasingly lost population to red states over the last year, congressional candidate and state Rep. Sabatini said the trend was unsurprising, expressing his belief it would increase with time.

“I’m not very surprised,” he said. “I think that you’re going to see this trend increase drastically going forward, especially now that the left is pushing lockdowns again and all this other garbage so you know there’s gonna be an even bigger trend [and] faster rate of people trying to get to red states.” 

While his state saw the second-highest population growth in the nation over the last year, Sabatini believed the same would continue to be seen for other “free” states.

“Not just Florida, but also Arizona, Texas, Georgia — other free states, and it’s really quite sad because there’s no reason for these other states to be destroying themselves but they’re in total cultural suicide right now,” he said. 

Anticipating that restrictions on freedom would not end with the current pandemic, he claimed that another pretext by Democrats to paralyze Americans’ freedom could always be found.

“Hundreds of thousands of people [have migrated and] that number is going to go up next year and it’ll probably continue the year after that because even though right now it’s COVID that’s causing them to choose to commit cultural suicide, there will be another pretext after that,” he warned. 

“There will be another excuse why [Democrat-run states] think they need to shut down and shut the economy and eclipse liberty, whatever it be they’re gonna do it again and again,” he added.

Sabatini also had a message for those leaving blue states for the Sunshine State.

“The message needs to be: leave any leftist politics behind, don’t take any scumbag-leftist-communist views into the state of Florida because we don’t like that,” he said.

“We don’t want that here, we don’t need that here, and anybody that’s not willing to adopt the Floridian lifestyle of freedom and prosperity needs to get the hell out of the state,” he added.

He also had harsh words for Ocasio-Cortez after the Democratic socialist congresswoman was seen vacationing maskless on New Year’s Eve while enjoying a drink with her boyfriend outside a Miami Beach restaurant as her home state of New York shelters amid the omicron surge, resulting in an online spat with Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis and other Republican figures.

“She’s a total communist; she’s a scumbag; she’s totally hypocritical,” he said.

“[She has] zero morals, no ethical fiber, just zero shame abandoning her own people in New York, coming to the ‘Free State of Florida,’ and then lying and pretending that there’s no hypocrisy there,” he added. “She’s an embarrassment.”

Noting that many are “having fun” calling out the congresswoman, Sabatini didn’t see the humor in the matter.

“I don’t think it’s really funny, I think it’s just awful, I think it’s disgusting,” he said. 

“I think she’s a really bad person in line with a lot of the corrupt communist leaders in the 20th century who just had a lot of excuses to explain why they were allowed to break the rules that they’ve set up for other people,” he added. “She’s an embarrassment to the United States, a really awful human.”

Sabatini’s remarks come as blue states that have repeatedly imposed mask mandates, vaccine requirements, and lockdowns over the last year have lost population to red states that have done away with such policies.

Newly released data from the United States Census Bureau reveals that while blue states like California and New York have increasingly lost population from July 2020 to July 2021, red states such as Texas and Florida have seen the largest population increases.

Thirty-three states saw population increases over the last year while 17 states, and Washington, DC, saw their populations decline. 

New York has suffered the largest numerical population decline with roughly 319,000 fewer residents today than a year ago. The state, and especially New York City, has imposed school closures, business lockdowns, vaccine requirements, and mask mandates sporadically over the last year.

Simultaneously, Texas — which has not had any statewide coronavirus-related restrictions since March — has gained over 310,000 residents.

Florida, which continued to remain open with little-to-no restrictions, saw the second-largest numeric population gains after Texas with more than 220,890 new residents, an increase analogous to adding a city roughly the size of Orlando.

Conversely, California and Illinois saw the largest population decreases after New York.

In California, where mask mandates and vaccine requirements remain policy in major cities, there are nearly 262,000 fewer residents than there were before July 2020. In Illinois, with similar restrictive coronavirus-related policies and a statewide mask mandate, there are nearly 114,000 fewer residents.

Follow Joshua Klein on Twitter @JoshuaKlein.