Overwhelmed with busloads of illegal immigrants, New York City Mayor Eric Adams declared a state of emergency Friday.
“This is unsustainable,” Adams said. “New York City is doing all we can, but we are reaching the outer limit of our ability to help.”
Adams said he’s facing a “situation where more people are arriving in New York City than we can immediately accommodate, including families with babies and young children.”
Once the illegal immigrants “from today’s buses are provided shelter, we would surpass the highest number of people in recorded history in our city’s shelter system,” he said.
Adams told reporters he needs both federal and state financial aid to handle the estimated $1 billion the illegal immigrants will cost the city this fiscal year.
In his statement, Democrat New York City Mayor Eric Adams said: “Today, I am declaring a state of emergency in the state of New York” to respond to Biden’s border crisis. “It’s not sustainable”.
The mayor had planned to build a tent city in a neighborhood in the Bronx, but he changed his mind after local residents complained of inhumane conditions for the immigrants and the harm to the community.
Adams said the state of emergency will remain in effect for 30 days and could be extended.
CNN reported New York City has more than 61,000 people in its shelter system. Since April, in a program announced by Republican Gov. Greg Abbott, more than 17,000 illegal immigrants have been bused to the city.
Others have been transported to Washington D.C., and Chicago in Abbott’s response to the Biden administration’s immigration policies.
The New York Post noted Adams put the blame “on everyone but himself and Gotham’s well-deserved reputation as a generous ‘sanctuary city’ for illegal immigrants.”
Adams said it’s a “humanitarian crisis that started with violence and instability in South America, and it’s being accelerated by American political dynamics,” referring to Abbott, Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida and others.
He also called on the mayor of El Paso, Democrat Oscar Leeser, to stop sending busloads of migrants to New York City.
“New York cannot accommodate the number of buses that we have coming here to our city,” Adams said. “El Paso, the city manager, the mayor, they should stop sending buses to New York.”
Adams said “this crisis is not of our own making but one that will affect everyone in this city now and in the months ahead.”
