Posted on October 29, 2024

Sanctuary City Sending Thousands of Migrants Back to Texas by Plane, Bus

Adam Shaw and Brooke Taylor, Fox News, October 28, 2024

New York City is buying tickets for thousands of migrants to travel to Texas via bus or plane, from where many of them originally traveled to the sanctuary city in the first place, amid an ongoing battle between officials over how to handle the migrant crisis.

New York City, which has been overwhelmed by more than 200,000 migrant arrivals since 2022, has been providing settlement options to migrants since that time. Last year, it opened a reticketing center to offer one-way plane tickets to migrants.

Fox News confirms that 4,500 migrants have been sent to Texas using bus or plane tickets bought by the city. The figure was first reported by Bloomberg News.

According to Mayor Eric Adams’ office, the top five destinations for migrants leaving the Big Apple are Texas, Illinois, Florida, New York State and Colorado.

In total, they have issued more than 4,700 tickets and the majority, roughly 4,500, have gone to Texas. It was not clear how many of those migrants had come from buses sent to NYC from Texas.

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Texas Gov. Greg Abbott began bussing migrants to New York City and other sanctuary cities in 2022 in what he said was an effort to relieve pressure on the overwhelmed border communities. He chose sanctuary cities – cities that limit cooperation with federal immigration enforcement – because he said they encouraged the crisis. An NYC spokesperson told Fox that the influx was exacerbated by Abbott and that resources have been exhausted in part due to his efforts.

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