Democrats have begun attacking Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson for his handling of the immigration crisis.
The Windy City is struggling to care for more than 34,000 asylum seekers bused in from the border by Texas Gov. Greg Abbott over the past 18 months.
It has spent $156 million on the crisis and still has 14,200 immigrants in its 28 shelters, and is fighting with the state of Illinois over where to build more.
Zerlina Smith-Members, a victim services advocate and candidate for the Cook County Board of Commissioners, is a Democrat who denounces Johnson’s policies.
“We have people who have come here illegally, who have jumped the line,” said Smith-Members, who is considering leading a recall against Johnson.
The city of Chicago may have decided it’s fed up with its role in the migrant crisis under progressive Mayor Brandon Johnson, and some Democrats hope to strip it of its “sanctuary city” status.
Chicago is struggling to care for more than 34,000 asylum seekers bused from the border by Texas Gov. Greg Abbott over the past 18 months.
She attributes the failure of the Windy City to Johnson, Democratic Illinois Governor JB Pritzker, and President Joe Biden.
‘It’s a Biden thing. It’s Pritzker’s thing. It’s a Brandon Johnson thing. They wanted sanctuary cities,” Smith-Members said. the national review.
‘It’s not Abbott’s fault, because he didn’t ask for it. We ask for it.’ Smith-Members plans to lead the charge against Democrats like Johnson, attempting to launch impeachment.
‘There is a division in our Democratic Party. It has weakened. It’s going to get worse,” Smith-Members said.
‘The voters of the city of Chicago have woken up. The voters of the state of Illinois have woken up. And they don’t support our old leadership.”
He added that if they don’t do it, “the immigration crisis is going to turn the state of Illinois purple.”
Illinois, the state that first elected Barack Obama to the Senate, has elected only one Republican governor and senator since the turn of the century.
Zerlina Smith-Members, a victim services advocate and candidate for the Cook County Board of Commissioners, is a Democrat willing to denounce Johnson’s policies.
She attributes the failure of the Windy City to Johnson, Democratic Illinois Governor JB Pritzker (pictured) and President Joe Biden.
The city has spent $156 million on the crisis and still has 14,200 immigrants in its 28 shelters, and is fighting with the state of Illinois over where to build more.
No Democrat has been elected mayor of Chicago since William Thompson in 1927.
Shelters in converted warehouses in Chicago have been filled to the brim with newcomers living in poor conditions, prompting the city to take over other locations.
Johnson has insisted that the city would not open any more migrant shelters and called on Illinois Governor JB Pritzker to make good on his promises to build his own.
Southside activist Tio Hardiman says the city needs to focus on its less fortunate residents before dealing with immigrants.
“The reality is, if you look at Chicago now, you have high unemployment rates among young African Americans in particular, there is a lack of mental health services in Chicago, there were already thousands of homeless people in Chicago who never were homeless,” They have ever focused on immigrants as if they were focused on them,” he said.
“If I were mayor right now, I would make an executive decision to end sanctuary city (status) in Chicago,” he added.
“I would get rid of it because we are not prepared to deal with it.”
Mayor Johnson himself says the huge influx of immigrants is unsustainable, but he can’t turn them away because Chicago is a “sanctuary city.”
A homeless tent is seen across Montrose Beach in Chicago
Migrants, with no place to stay when they arrive in the city, seek safe refuge inside the Chicago Police Department’s District 12 station
He blamed both the Biden Administration and Texas for his city having difficulty serving the approximately 15,000 asylum seekers. crammed into 28 shelters throughout the city.
Governor Abbott has sent more than 25,300 migrants to Chicago since August 2022, on buses.
Chicago attempted to get them to designated locations during business hours and confiscated buses that did not follow these rules.
However, bus companies responded by dropping migrants up to 60 miles from Chicago, and Abbott began sending them on charter flights.
Conditions at Chicago migrant shelters have been under the microscope since five-year-old Jean Carlo Martínez Rivero died on December 17.
Johnson maintained that there was “no evidence that shelter conditions caused this young man’s death.”
Volunteers trying to help asylum seekers as best they can argue differently, presenting lists of concerns to city officials months before Jean’s death.
Photos and videos inside the shelter where he died showed 2,300 migrants crowded together in frigid temperatures under a leaky roof.
One video showed a boy with what appeared to be a bandage on his head lying on a thin folding bed, distracting himself with a tablet.
Another shows a different child coughing and crying while having his temperature taken and being examined by volunteers.
A third video showed water dripping from the ceiling and pooling on one of the beds.