Democratic strongholds are finally reeling from the migration policies their party has enthusiastically championed for so long.
New York City’s Deputy Mayor of Health and Human Services, Anne Williams-Isom, announced during a press briefing on Wednesday that for the first time, the number of asylum-seeking migrants being taken care of by the city has surpassed the number of homeless New York residents under municipal care.
As Fox News reports, New York is presently looking after more than 50,000 migrants — a figure Williams-Isom said is “unsustainable.”
“You see from today’s numbers that we have reached a tipping point,” the Health and Human Services chief said. “We now have more asylum seekers in our care than longtime New Yorkers … who were in our existing DHS system.”
Referring to the situation as a “humanitarian crisis,” Williams-Isom urged the federal government to alleviate the city’s woes by sending monetary aid and material resources.
Last week saw 2,500 more migrants taken in by the city, she said. In total, New York has accepted responsibility for over 81,200 migrants since Spring 2022. To meet the huge demand, the city has created 12 Humanitarian Emergency Response and Relief Centers and 176 shelter sites. An extension of contracts for 10 navigation sites (and the opening of an 11th) alone will be costing New Yorkers an additional $2.3 million.
The crisis has put Democratic Mayor Eric Adams and other elected officials in a bind. To deal with the flood of migrants, Adams has enacted a program of transporting migrants out of the city to other counties, other states, and even other countries — though he has criticized Republican-led states such as Texas and Florida for doing the same thing.
As The New American previously reported, New York City spent approximately $50,000 between April 2022 and April 2023 for the resettlement of 114 migrant families.
The top destination for these relocations was Florida, which took 28 families. Texas, with 14 families, came in second place. In third place was North Carolina, which received six families. In total, New York City’s Department of Social Services assisted with travel to 64 cities in 27 states.
Adams’ administration even purchased migrants plane tickets to foreign nations like Colombia, China, Peru, Ecuador, and Venezuela. The relocations decision are based on where migrants choose to go and the destinations are often locations where the migrants have family awaiting them.
But some counties that have found themselves the recipients of New York City’s excess migrants have taken issue with Adams’ policy, taking action to prevent it — to which the New York mayor has responded with a lawsuit against 30 counties.
Per Fox News:
However, his policy puts the city in conflict with several New York counties that do not want to house the migrants. Those counties have said giving shelter to migrants would threaten public safety, citing reports of rampant drug use and lawless behavior at the hotels where New York City has placed asylum-seekers. Several counties and a town have obtained restraining orders against the city preventing migrants from being housed in their jurisdictions.
The mayor’s office called claims of threats to public safety “baseless” and said that the city is only trying to house a “relatively small” number of people in outside jurisdictions.
So far, the court system has given Adams a tentative win, with a federal judge blocking the orders which two of the counties had put in place to stop the migrant relocations.
Adams has even floated the idea of paying homeowners and landlords to house migrants in spare rooms.
The mayor described his plan earlier this month at a press conference unveiling the launch of a two-year partnership with New York Disaster Interfaith Services (NYDIS) to allow up to 50 churches to double as overnight shelters for single adult men.
Declared Adams:
It is my vision to take the next step to this, go to the faith-based locales and then move to a private residence. There are residents who are suffering right now because of economic challenges. They have spare rooms. They have locales…. It’s cheaper, and it’s a good investment for us to go to a family and assist them instead of placing people in large congregate settings or in these emergency hotels. The closer we bring the asylum seekers in, the migrants to everyday New Yorkers, the easier it will be for them to transition into society.
Ironically, New York is a sanctuary city, meaning it shields illegal migrants from deportation and prosecution instead of cooperating with federal immigration enforcement authorities such as ICE. Adams has proudly touted his city’s sanctuary status in the past. But now, the Big Apple is having to confront the reality of what being a sanctuary city really means.
It’s a fitting turn of events. Perhaps if more communities were forced to live with the consequences of the leftist immigration policies they claim to support on paper, they would quickly change tune.
