Gov. Abbott charters plane to Chicago for migrants after city impounded bus from Texas

After sending more than 80,000 migrants by bus to various U.S. "sanctuary cities" where Democrats are in charge, Gov. Greg Abbott this week chartered a plane to fly about 120 migrants from El Paso to Chicago.

The flight, which video from the governor's office showed included several children accompanied by adults, took off Tuesday for O'Hare International Airport — one day after Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson announced his city had impounded a bus that originated from the Texas border city of Eagle Pass with 49 migrants aboard because it dropped off passengers without a permit.

A Chicago ordinance updated this month allows the city to tow and impound "buses that refuse to comply with safety protocols."

Abbott spokesman Andrew Mahaleris said Chicago's ordinance change was hypocritical and retaliatory.

"Because Mayor Johnson is failing to live up to his city's 'Welcoming City' ordinance by targeting migrant buses from Texas, we are expanding our operation to include flights to Chicago, like the Biden Administration has been doing across the country," Mahaleris said in an email.

Although U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement uses chartered and commercial flights to return unlawful immigrants to their countries of origin or to "ICE-managed detention facilities and staging areas," the Poynter Institute's PolitiFact last year ruled claims that the Biden administration uses air travel to relocate immigrants to communities around the country as "mostly false."

More: 1 day after Gov. Greg Abbott signs SB4, El Paso County files legal challenge

Abbott, under the auspices of his border initiative dubbed Operation Lone Star, has sent nearly 83,000 migrants to various cities around the country — including Los Angeles, New York and Washington — since April 2022, ostensibly to show political leaders there the burden unlawful immigration places on municipal and charitable resources. The cost per rider has been put at about $1,300, according to data provided by the Texas Division of Emergency Management.

The migrants who voluntarily agree to be transported must show state officials documentation from the U.S. Homeland Security Department that they've been processed and cleared by federal immigration authorities to remain legally in the United States, at least temporarily, according to Abbott's office. None of the migrants being bused out of Texas are believed to be in the country illegally.

The governor's office did not immediately respond to a question about the cost of the Chicago flight, but it said the migrants aboard the passenger airliner had signed consent forms written in languages they could read.

Mayors of several cities where migrants have been shipped to from Texas have been critical of Abbott's bus program.

Johnson, Chicago's mayor, said in a recent news release that sending migrants to his Midwest city as winter approaches is "inhumane treatment (that) further endangers the safety and security of asylum seekers, and adds additional strain to City departments, volunteers and mutual aid partners tasked with easing what is already a harsh transition."

In August, a 3-year-old Venezuelan girl who had boarded a Texas-provided bus headed to Chicago with her family died en route in Illinois after showing symptoms that included a fever and diarrhea. Texas officials later issued a statement saying that "prior to boarding, no passenger presented with a fever or medical concerns."

The autopsy of the child, who was days shy of her 4th birthday, found: "The child had reportedly begun experiencing mild symptoms and began feeling ill as the family boarded the bus in Brownsville. At that point, she had a low-grade fever only, and was allowed to board the bus."

The child's death raised questions about medical screenings for the state-sponsored bus trips, which critics have denounced as dangerous and chaotic.

“There’s a lot of concern about lack of transparency in general regarding these bus rides,” said Priscilla Olivarez, a policy attorney and strategist at the Immigrant Legal Resource Center. “There’s no oversight and no accountability.”

At a news conference Monday, before the flight from Texas, Johnson ripped Abbott over his busing program.

“We have a governor — a governor — an elected official in that state of Texas that is placing families on buses without shoes, cold, wet, tired, hungry, afraid, traumatized,” Johnson said. “The governor of Texas needs to take a look in the mirror of the chaos that he’s causing for this country.”

More: El Paso turns to Gov. Greg Abbott's busing program to help migrants on their way

Of the estimated 25,000 migrants sent to Chicago, Johnson said the city has "resettled or reunited" more than 10,000. Food, shelter and "wraparound services" have been provided for the others, he added.

The Biden administration continued its criticism of Abbott's tactic in the wake of the Chicago flight.

“Yet again, Governor Abbott is showing how little regard or respect he has for human beings,” said White House spokesperson Angelo Fernández Hernández in a statement. “This latest political stunt just adds to his tally of extreme policies which seek to demonize and dehumanize people.”

But in Texas, Abbott's hard-line approach to immigration, which includes a law the governor signed this week allowing state law enforcement officers to arrest, detain and deport individuals suspected of illegally crossing the border into Texas, appears to remain popular.

According to a poll released Tuesday by the Texas Politics Project, an arm of the University of Texas, more than 80% of respondents said they support policies to tighten border security with increased technology, infrastructure and personnel, and 61% support additional border wall construction.

The Legislature this year allocated $1.54 billion at Abbott's behest to for the state to add to the border barriers installed during the Trump administration.

USA Today reporter Rick Jervis contributed to this report.

This article originally appeared on Austin American-Statesman: Abbott's migrant busing escalates with chartered plane to Chicago