As cities struggle to cope with an influx of new arrivals from the border, the US president is getting tougher on asylum seekers. But will it fix the problem?
Like many who have crossed the border from Latin America, they arrived in New York after a desperate journey. But these men have few options in the city, often relying on one man in the Bronx.
The overcrowding come on the heels of Mayor Adams blasting Colorado Gov. Jared Polis, a fellow Democrat, for sending hundreds of migrants to New York in recent weeks after they arrived in his state.
The Supreme Court is temporarily blocking an order that would lift pandemic-era restrictions on asylum seekers, but the brief order leaves open the prospect that the restrictions in place since the coronavirus pandemic began, which have been used to turn back hundreds of thousands of prospective asylum seekers, could still expire on Wednesday.
Mayor Eric Adams said the city was in “urgent need” of state and federal funds to support new arrivals, estimating an influx of around 1,000 people per week as a Trump-era rule that closed the border to migrants is set to expire.