By: Ilana Siyance
During a visit to the Texas border city of El Paso, New York Mayor Eric Adams offered up a blistering criticism of the federal government’s response to the influx of immigrants into U.S. cities, saying, “We need clear coordination,” the AP reported on Monday.
He said Sunday that cities where immigrants are flowing to need help from the Federal Emergency Management Agency.
“Our cities are being undermined. And we don’t deserve this. Migrants don’t deserve this. And the people who live in the cities don’t deserve this,” Adams said as he wrapped up a weekend visit to El Paso, as was reported by the AP. “We expect more from our national leaders to address this issue in a real way.”
Adams said New York City has been overwhelmed with migrants seeking new homes. The AP reported that since last spring, New York City has welcomed about 40,000 asylum seekers, and last week they saw a record of close to 840 asylum seekers arriving in one day, according to Adams.
“New York cannot take more. We can’t,” Adams said, according to the AP report. He added that other cities also can’t take more. “No city deserves what is happening,” he said.
“Over 36,000 people have gone through our system, roughly 24,000 are still there. And it’s more just a bed to sleep. It is food, clothing, education, healthcare; all of these things and it’s draining the resources of everyday New Yorkers. And it’s just unfair,” he said in an interview.
The mayor now estimates that the migrant crisis will cost the Big Apple as much as $2 billion — which is double the initial estimate.
“We have to ask ourselves, where we were already dealing with a potential $5, $6 billion budget deficit in the out years. Where does that money come from?” said Adams Friday in an interview with Caribbean Power Jam Radio.
The Mayor has already announced budget cuts for every city agency, and has called it “irresponsible” that the federal government has not yet stepped up to announce aid in response to the border crisis. “That money comes from our schools. It comes from our public safety, our hospitals, our infrastructure, our ACS services, those are our tax dollars that it’s coming from and we got to see an impact in every service we have in the city,” Adams said.
Adams, a Democrat, also criticized the practice of some governors of transporting immigrants straight from the border to cities including New York City. The AP reported that Texas Gov. Greg Abbott, a Republican, over the last year has sent buses of immigrants to Democratic-led cities as a way to maximize exposure over what he said is inaction by the Biden administration over high numbers of migrants crossing on the southern border.
On Sunday, Adams spent time in El Paso, Texas to get a closer look at the border crisis that has hit home.
As reported by the NY Post, the mayor visited migrant shelters, a border patrol processing facility and the Southern border, then met with local officials including El Paso Mayor Oscar Leeser before flying back home to NYC. His busy day at the source of the migrant disaster included a stop to a Customs and Border Protection processing facility in El Paso. He also held a press conference later in the day. Mayor Adam’s meeting with Mayor Leeser, who has bussed thousands of migrants into NYC, highlighted how the community there is dealing with the migrant crisis.
