Chicago’s migrant crises deepens: taxpayers rail against $65M shelters for homeless arrivals as temperatures plummet. ‘These people are just getting off the bus and everything …
By James Reinl, Social Affairs Correspondent, For Dailymail.Com[1]
Published: 16:28, 1 December 2023 | Updated: 16:30, 1 December 2023
Chicagoans are turning on Mayor Brandon Johnson’s ‘open doors’ policy to migrants, staging daily protests against expensive new government-run tent shelters for the homeless[2] newcomers.
Hundreds of locals attended a community meeting this week, and dozens more have staged protests near a construction site where one of two new shelters is being built in Chicago[3]‘s Brighton[4] Park neighborhood.
The shelters, funded by the state of Illinois[5], are set to open within weeks.
They will house up to 2,200 asylum seekers and cost £65 million to build and accommodate some of those migrants sleeping on floors or in tents outside city police stations.
Residents protest in Brighton Park against a proposed migrant camp to accommodate the influx of migrants
Workers erect a tent frame as they start building Chicago’s first government-run tent encampment for migrants in the Brighton Park neighborhood
Community members in Brighton Park are suing the city to try to halt construction.
They say it will lead to overcrowding, is being built on dangerous, contaminated land, and violates Chicago zoning laws.
Longtime resident Ricardo Palacios told Reuters that taxpayers like him should not have to foot the bill for new arrivals, many of whom have fled insecurity and abysmal government in Venezuela.
‘These people are just getting off the bus and everything’s given to them,’ said Palacios.
‘As a taxpayer, I don’t think that’s right.’
The city of 2.6 million people has been among the worst-affected by a surge of asylum seekers and illegal entries at the southern border since President Joe Biden[6] took office in January 2021.
Hundreds of migrants are still sleeping on floors or in tents outside city police stations, which have been used to accommodate the surge.
Some who remained this week huddled near tents wearing parkas, knit hats and even ski goggles to cope with the falling snow and cold weather, which has fallen to the low 40s in recent days.
The crisis has been so bad that some migrants camped out at O’Hare International Airport.
Chicago’s progressive Mayor Brandon Johnson said there was enough room for migrants when he took office in May
Venezuelan migrants look over new clothes, outside a police station where they have sought shelter since arriving in Chicago
Hundreds of asylum seekers temporarily bedded down at the O’Hare International Airport in Chicago, Illinois
In recent weeks, the city and churches have stepped up efforts to move migrants into shelters.
Some 1,000 asylum seekers remain at police stations, down from 4,000 three weeks ago, according to city figures.
Mayor Johnson has struggled to find places for the arriving migrants.
Upon taking office in May, an African-American, progressive Democrat[7], said there was ‘enough room’ for the migrants.
Speaking this week, however, he slammed Texas[8] Governor Greg Abbott[9] for laying on buses that have taken tens of thousands of migrants from the border up to Democrat-run sanctuary cities.
Johnson this week called it ‘right-wing extremism’ aimed at cities ‘led by people of color.’
‘Their whole motivation is to create disruption and chaos,’ said Johnson, who seeks more federal funds to tackle the crisis.
Since April 2022, Texas has bused more than 66,000 migrants to six Democratic-run cities, four of which have black mayors — Chicago, New York, Los Angeles[10] and Washington.
Renae Eze, a spokesperson for the Texas governor, slammed Johnson’s comments as ‘falsehoods and outright lies.’
‘In May, Mayor Johnson welcomed migrants to Chicago, saying the city has ‘enough room’ for them,’ Eze said in a statement.
‘With millions of residents, Chicago is only dealing with a fraction of what our small border communities deal with on a day-to-day basis.’
Camarota’s study shows that immigrant numbers are at a record high, both numerically and as a share of the total population
Republicans hardliners are pushing to impeach Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas over his alleged failure to secure the southern border
Chaotic scenes at the southern border have become a hot-button issue, stoking fears of an ‘invasion’ that divides Democrats and Republicans, even as business owners say more workers are needed to grow the economy.
An immigration watchdog this week said America’s foreign-born population has swollen massively under Biden[11] and reached a record-breaking 49.5 million, or 15 percent of the country’s population.
The Center for Immigration Studies (CIS), a conservative think tank, says the influx of 4.5 million people since Biden took office in January 2021 includes 2.5 million people estimated to have entered the US unlawfully.
Steven Camarota, the group’s research director, said the foreign-born population was growing by 137,000 people each month — far higher than under Biden’s predecessors — straining schools, hospitals and other services.
For his study, Camarota used data from the federal government’s Current Population Survey.
He found that the rate of growth of the foreign born population was ‘truly enormous.’
Since Biden got the keys to the White House[12], it has grown by 137,000 people each month, he said.
That’s much faster than under his predecessors Donald Trump[13], when it grew by 42,000 each month in the period before the Covid-19[14] outbreak saw borders shutter, and Barack Obama[15], when it grew by 68,000 each month.
Camarota said his findings made the government’s official population forecasts ‘obsolete.’
The foreign-born population was not expected to reach 15 percent of the total number until 2033.
According to Camarota’s number crunching, the country has already reached that point.
Most of the newcomers are from South and Central America, the Caribbean, Africa, and the Middle East, says his report.
Steven Camarota, director of research for the Center for Immigration Studies, has long called for reduced people flows
Immigrants can be a boon, opening businesses that breathe new life into run-down areas, like this Chinese restaurant in downtown Los Angeles
Immigrant street vendors have rallied against the lack of licenses for their small businesses in New York City
Even though there’s been an uptick in non-legal immigration, some three quarters of America’s foreign-born population are in the country legally — mostly through employment and family-based immigration routes.
Social media users have shared Camarota’s study as further evidence of a migration crisis.
Still, others say the US should keep its borders open for those fleeing violence and poverty in their home countries on humanitarian grounds.
Others still say America needs more foreigners to grow its economy and keep pace with growth in China, India and elsewhere.
Camarota’s organization, CIS, has been criticized for being alarmist and inaccurate, and even as a racist hate group by the left-wing Southern Poverty Law Center.
References
- ^ James Reinl, Social Affairs Correspondent, For Dailymail.Com (www.dailymail.co.uk)
- ^ homeless (www.dailymail.co.uk)
- ^ Chicago (www.dailymail.co.uk)
- ^ Brighton (www.dailymail.co.uk)
- ^ Illinois (www.dailymail.co.uk)
- ^ Joe Biden (www.dailymail.co.uk)
- ^ Democrat (www.dailymail.co.uk)
- ^ Texas (www.dailymail.co.uk)
- ^ Greg Abbott (www.dailymail.co.uk)
- ^ Los Angeles (www.dailymail.co.uk)
- ^ America’s foreign-born population has swollen massively under Biden (www.dailymail.co.uk)
- ^ White House (www.dailymail.co.uk)
- ^ Donald Trump (www.dailymail.co.uk)
- ^ Covid-19 (www.dailymail.co.uk)
- ^ Barack Obama (www.dailymail.co.uk)