New York City Mayor Eric Adams was finally given a dose of reality about what residents who live near the border have been going through for years.
Adams says New York is at a breaking point due to the number of illegal immigrants who keep arriving in the city and needing services.
Mayor Eric Adams is railing against the Biden administration’s open border policy, warning New Yorkers don’t want the mass influx of undocumented migrants from the southern border on their block or in their community.
“Last week and a half ago, we got 4,200 people in one week. This week, we got 900 people on one day,” Adams lamented during an appearance on Carribean Power Jam Radio.
“We’ve run out of space, you know, where to put people then whenever we try to find creative ways, people are pushing back and say, ‘Well, we don’t want it on our block. We don’t want it in our community,” he said. “The federal government has now created this crisis and it’s really undermining our whole city. That’s what I needed New Yorkers to understand. This is undermining all of the progress we have made because of the failure of our federal government.”
Approximately 50 percent of hotel rooms in New York City are now occupied by illegal immigrants.
Adams is starting to panic because he knows this is a massive loss in tourism dollars for the city.
On Tuesday, Adams asked a judge to grant permission for the city to suspend its long-standing “right to shelter” policy as it struggles to provide housing, food, and legal services to thousands of illegal aliens.
The “right to shelter” policy guarantees that every homeless individual, regardless of immigration status, is entitled to a safe place to stay. However, with the recent surge of illegal immigrants, resources are being stretched thin, leading to overcrowding in existing facilities and an inability to meet the growing demand for shelter.
The policy was established through a combination of court decisions and legislative actions.
In 1979, a lawsuit known as Callahan v. Carey was filed on behalf of homeless individuals in New York City, claiming a violation of their constitutional rights. In 1981, the New York State Supreme Court ruled in favor of the plaintiffs, recognizing a constitutional right to shelter. This ruling was later upheld by the New York Court of Appeals, the state’s highest court.
“New York City Mayor Eric Adams today released the following statement after the New York City Department of Law filed an application for modification of provision of final judgment following a 1984 consent decree in Callahan v. Carey related to the city’s Right to Shelter law,” according to the news release.
“From the start, let us be clear, that we are in no way seeking to end the right to shelter. Today’s action will allow us to get clarity from the court and preserve the right to shelter for the tens of thousands in our care — both previously unhoused individuals and asylum seekers. Given that we’re unable to provide care for an unlimited number of people and are already overextended, it is in the best interest of everyone, including those seeking to come to the United States, to be upfront that New York City cannot single-handedly provide care to everyone crossing our border. Being dishonest about this will only result in our system collapsing, and we need our government partners to know the truth and do their share.
“For more than a year, New York City has — largely on its own — provided shelter, food, clothing, and more to over 70,000 migrants who have arrived in our city. We now have more asylum seekers in our care than New Yorkers experiencing homelessness when we came into office. When the original Callahan consent decree came down almost 40 years ago, no one could have contemplated, foresaw, or even remotely imagined a mass influx of individuals entering our system — more than doubling our census count in slightly over a year. Our city has done more to support asylum seekers than any other city in the nation, but the unfortunate reality is that the city has extended itself further than its resources will allow.”
Earlier this month, Adams also asked a judge to reevaluate New York City’s ‘sanctuary city’ status in light of the influx of illegal immigrants.
“The law of sanctuary city was in place long before I became mayor. I’m following the law. As a law enforcement person, you know, we follow the law,” Adams said.
“We are now in court now, today, asking the judge to revisit this law to deal with this humanitarian crisis because, even when they decided to put in place that law, no one thought they would be dealing with a humanitarian crisis of this proportion,” he added.
You may recall that in 2021, Adams said that New York City would continue to be a “sanctuary city” for illegal immigrants under his watch.
So, what happened?
— ChristopherReese (@ChristopReese) August 9, 2022