Footage earlier this month of an illegal immigrant flipping the bird at reporters after being arrested and then released following the assault of a police officer in New York City perfectly summed up the dilemma sanctuary cities such as New York find themselves in. Over-eager to prove their liberal bonafides, these cities have welcomed and protected thousands of criminal immigrants who just so happen to realize they can flout the law without consequence. And now they’re stuck with them.
Perhaps it is this image that is forcing Democrats to admit that preventing immigration officials from removing illegal immigrants who pose a threat to their communities may have been a mistake. New York City Mayor Eric Adams, for example, insisted this week that the city’s sanctuary policies, at the very least, must be modified “so that if you commit a felony … we should be able to turn you over to ICE and have you deported.”
Adams has learned this the hard way. The city has experienced a significant crime spike, a good portion of which is tied to the illegal immigrants flooding its streets. New York shelters for illegal immigrants have had to enact curfews and install cameras in an effort to control the violence that regularly breaks out. Officials are even considering installing metal detectors in the facilities as well.
Illegal immigrants have also been involved in an uptick of robberies throughout New York, with police arresting seven immigrants from Venezuela this month who allegedly committed at least 62 robberies across five of the city’s boroughs. (Ironically, crime in Venezuela has been going down over the past several months, its violent death rate falling to a 22-year low as hundreds of thousands of single men from the country pour over our southern border.)
The obvious solution would be to arrest and deport any illegal immigrant convicted of breaking the law — or, at the very least, the city could throw those charged behind bars.
New York refuses to do either. Its sanctuary city policies prevent local law enforcement from working with immigration officials to deport criminal immigrants, and its general reluctance to impose any sort of consequence on those who break the law means too many criminals, illegal immigrants or not, end up right back on the streets.
The constant drain on resources that accompanies illegal immigration is also forcing Democrats to reconsider their policies. In Chicago, a growing number of city leaders and activists have expressed frustration with its sanctuary city status after Mayor Brandon Johnson allocated $138 million of the city’s funds to sheltering and feeding illegal immigrants. Their parks and community centers are being turned into makeshift shelters as the city struggles to find room for the tens of thousands of illegal immigrants arriving every month.
CLICK HERE TO READ MORE FROM THE WASHINGTON EXAMINER
Even Gov. J.B. Pritzker (D-IL), who proudly signed an executive order in 2019 declaring illegal immigrants as “critical to the fabric of our state,” has resorted to begging Texas for “mercy” and to stop sending them north.
Of course, it’s highly unlikely Adams or Pritzker will actually do what must be done and push their party to abandon its nonsensical sanctuary policies. They’d much rather point the finger at Texas for sending illegal immigrants to them in the first place or at the Biden administration for not providing them with enough funding to back their sanctuary commitments. They’ll blame anyone but themselves when the fact is this crisis has been entirely self-inflicted.
