New York City mayor Eric Adams toured the border town of El Paso, Texas, on Sunday and demanded the Biden administration address illegal border crossings.
During a press conference with the city’s Democratic mayor Oscar Leeser, Adams underscored that his visit to El Paso was to bring attention to the issue.
“We’re pointing the finger at our national government,” Adams said.
“This is a national problem. We must have real immigration reform, and we must immediately have a short-term fix of making sure that the cost of this does not fall on our local cities,” he added.
Adams said last Friday that New York City was at its “breaking point” dealing with an influx of migrants and asylum seekers, many of whom were bussed to the city by frustrated border state politicians such as Leeser.
Leeser got himself in hot water last year for declaring a state of emergency, reportedly in defiance of White House wishes.
According to some estimates, as many as 40,000 migrants have made their way to New York City in the last year from border towns such as El Paso, straining local resources. City Hall reportedly spent $366 million providing services for asylum seekers in 2022, with Adams expecting the figure to potentially rise beyond $2 billion through the first half of 2023.
“Our cities are being undermined. And we don’t deserve this. Migrants don’t deserve this. And people who live in the cities don’t deserve this,” Adams said, demanding that “national leaders” address the issue ” in a real way.”
Adams’s visit comes on the heels of President Joe Biden’s long-anticipated tour of El Paso last Sunday.
“The president caused the chaos at the border, needed to be here. It just so happens he’s two years and about $20 billion too late,” Texas governor Greg Abbott told reporters on the tarmac after President Biden touched down in El Paso.
Adams will address the U.S. Conference of Mayors later this week in the capital.