Blue states open 2024 election year with migrant crisis escalating

NEW YORK — New York City Mayor Eric Adams had advice Tuesday for fellow mayors experiencing an influx of migrants: Set limits like he did.

After Texas Gov. Greg Abbott bussed hundreds of migrants to transit stations in New Jersey’s suburbs over the weekend — an end-run around Adams’ restrictions on new arrivals — Democratic leaders in the Garden State were seriously considering the advice. The mayor of one of New Jersey’s largest municipalities even said he arranged for a chartered bus to send migrants back to the southern border should more arrive in his town.

And halfway across the country in Chicago, which is set to host the Democratic National Convention this year, officials were scrambling to track asylum seekers after Abbott sent 350 to an airport 90 miles from a designated landing spot. His administration then bussed the migrants to suburban towns, forcing them to find their own way to Chicago.

The episodes marked another pivotal moment in the national debate over migrant resettlement. Democrats are now confronting a deepening crisis at the dawn of a crucial election year, and the ongoing feud over border control could determine who serves in the White House and who controls Congress.

Democrats around the country — from Adams to New York Gov. Kathy Hochul to White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre — accused Abbott of heartless brinkmanship. They said his moves to send chartered planes and buses of asylum seekers to far-flung communities outside New York City and Chicago were designed to sidestep rules requiring a coordinated effort to transport the new arrivals.

“We’re dealing with a bully right now, and everything is on the table that conforms with the law,” Adams, whose city has processed more than 160,000 migrants since spring 2022, said on Tuesday.

The mayor said he hopes to pressure Abbott “until he throws his hand” — but he did not detail what that would entail.

Abbott didn’t seem to care, proudly announcing on X, the platform formerly known as Twitter, that Texas had transported more than 95,000 migrants to northern cities and more were on the way.

“Sanctuary cities like NYC & Chicago have seen only a FRACTION of what overwhelmed Texas border towns face daily,” Abbott posted on the site Tuesday afternoon, vowing to continue his “mission” until President Joe Biden addresses border security.

Sending migrants to the New York City suburbs has electoral implications in the House, with several competitive districts in New York and New Jersey among the nation’s most competitive this November. Biden has received low approvals from voters over his handling of immigration, and Republicans have painted it as a problem that he and fellow Democrats own. And even Democrats are divided on how the president has dealt with border security, according to a Monmouth University poll last month.

Last week, Adams dialed up his effort to control the situation by ordering that buses carrying migrants from the southern border arrive only between 8:30 a.m. and noon on weekdays. His executive order, which mirrors rules in Chicago, also required 32 hours’ advance notice. Not one bus from Texas had complied with New York City’s executive order as of Tuesday, Adams’ chief counsel, Lisa Zornberg, said.

The mayor, who has effectively severed his relationship with Biden over the migrant crisis, rejected the idea that his mandate is sowing confusion in neighboring communities.

“The goal of the EO is to coordinate people coming into our city,” he told reporters. “The goal is not to have this cascade of EOs; that’s a byproduct. The goal is to coordinate.”

But in New Jersey, confusion reigned over the holiday weekend and officials in New York suburbs reacted quickly after Adams’ order.

Buses of migrants were sent to various train station stops headed toward New York City in towns, including Edison, Secaucus and Fanwood. New Providence, a suburb around 30 miles away from Manhattan, became the most recent New Jersey municipality with migrants bussed there from Houston, according to that town's mayor.

“We had one bus [Monday] that came at four in the morning, dropped off about 30 to 40 migrants,” New Providence Mayor Allen Morgan, who said he was informed of the matter by New Jersey Transit, said in an interview. “They all had train fare tickets.”

In Trenton, the state’s capital, Mayor Reed Gusciora said there were four buses of migrants that came to the city train station in recent days, with nearly all migrants en route to New York City. Gusciora said he was considering an executive order similar to the one Adams issued to limit migrant drop-offs, although he said he is holding off on the idea after consulting with Gov. Phil Murphy’s office.

“I think all municipalities and the city should have some certitude of how many visitors they’re getting,” Gusciora said in an interview, adding that he’d need his City Council to work with him. “And the times of their arrivals would be very helpful.”

With one bus coming into Trenton as early as 4 a.m., he said, prior notification or time windows should be implemented so people can be accommodated in case they have food or medical needs. The concern from Murphy’s office, Gusciora said, was that a patchwork of rules from different municipalities could come with unintended consequences and that “something like this should be done uniformly and if we plug only one hole in the dike another hole would crop up in another municipality.”

A spokesperson for Murphy’s office declined to comment on the matter and referred to a prior statement from the governor’s office that said that the state is being used as a “transit point” for bussed migrants en route to New York City.

New Jersey’s nascent role in the migrant bussing situation has drawn backlash from the top official in one of the state’s largest municipalities. Edison Mayor Sam Joshi, a Democrat, said in an interview that “we’re not going to have migrants stay in Edison.”

Joshi said that migrants sent to his town — where nearly 45 percent of the population is foreign born, according to U.S. Census figures — could be bussed back to the southern border. It was unclear what the cost of the busing would be.

“We have directed our emergency management to have a charter bus on standby if necessary to send the migrants back to the southern border,” he said. “The migrants need to be vetted through customs, they need to go through the legal process. That's my position.”

“Immigrants overwhelmingly in Edison township went through the legal process,” he said. “Just like my family, just like my friends, just like all the people that I've grown up with.”

Jersey City Mayor Steven Fulop — who is running for New Jersey governor in 2025 — called for a statewide response on X, adding: “We must be smart in how we approach this and have a statewide solution but also we MUST be compassionate first here and help where we can.”

In the northern suburbs of New York City, the supervisors of Clarkstown and Haverstraw have already banned unannounced migrant drop-offs in the days since Adams dramatically narrowed the window during which chartered buses of migrants can arrive.

Adams said that unlike Texas’ Abbott, he’s been communicating with other municipalities.

Texas has also sidestepped new rules for sending migrants to Chicago, which has seen more than 26,000 asylum seekers arrive since August 2022.

At 1 a.m. on Sunday, a Boeing 777 from San Antonio dropped off 350 asylum seekers to the airport in Rockford, about 90 miles west of Chicago. Eight buses chartered by Abbott’s administration then dropped off the migrants to surrounding suburbs. The new arrivals took trains and other modes of transportation from there to make their way to the landing zone in downtown Chicago, according to the city.

The move follows rules passed last month to fine bus companies that don’t follow the drop-off procedures for migrants. They include only delivering the new arrivals to the city’s landing zone on Mondays through Fridays between 8 a.m. and 5 p.m.