NYC, Chicago, Denver Fine Buses Transporting Migrants

Mayors of New York, Chicago, and Denver are responding to the mass influx of migrants from the southern border by enforcing regulations or imposing fines on bus operators transporting them from Texas, or other border states for that matter, CNN reported.

This initiative follows Texas Gov. Greg Abbott's strategy of sending migrants to sanctuary cities. Abbott has done so since April 2022.

In New York City, Mayor Eric Adams issued an executive order stipulating fines, jail time, and the possible impounding of buses that don't comply.

With resources in sanctuary cities being strained and with the Biden administration threatening to sue Texas over a potential law to deport migrants, the migrant situation continues to worsen. 

In October, Department of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas told the Mexican news media, per The New York Times, that the most basic means of defending the border, i.e., a wall, will not be a goal.

"From day one," Mayorkas told reporters, "this administration has made clear that a border wall is not the answer. That remains our position, and our position has never wavered."

In the CNN report, Denver's Mayor Mike Johnston said, "The frustrating thing for us is we know this problem is solvable. … It's actually clear for us there is a path to solve it. And that's why we need Congress to take action. I think the White House sees the same path to solve it."

Johnston referred to the Biden administration's $106 billion supplemental spending bill, which ties aid to support of the wars in Ukraine, Israel, the Indo-Pacific, and the border together. But in the background of all this, resources in sanctuary cities are still being drained by the migrant crisis.

Moreover, according to Politico, as the 118th Congress was kicking off in January, Republicans "pushed for, and won, provisions that require bills be focused on a single subject — part of an effort to reign in sprawling, take-it-or-leave-it legislative behemoths that both parties' leaders have muscled through in the past."

Tying domestic border security with foreign military aid ostensibly breaks that tenet of the 118th Congress.

• Chicago Suburbs Reject Migrant Buses Amid Influx Crisis
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