Mayor Lori Lightfoot Declares State Of Emergency As Migrants Flood Chicago's Streets – 'We Don't Have Any More Space'

Mayor of Chicago, Lori Lightfoot, has had to issue a state of emergency declaration on Tuesday as migrants pour into the city en masse in what her office has deemed a “national humanitarian crisis.”

Migrants have been bussed to Chicago from Texas since last August, as Governor Greg Abbott (R-TX) pushes the immense number of people who cross the border onto politicians who advocate for more open borders. Just recently on May 1st, Abbott informed Lightfoot that he had no intention of letting up on the buses despite pleas from the Democrat mayor, per NBC News.

The Chicago mayor's office has now had to issue the declaration, due to the number of migrants that have arrived and overwhelmed “the City’s ability to manage that inflow,” per CBS News. The declaration will allow the city to funnel more money to accommodate the migrants. 

Due to the intense number of new arrivals, shelters in Chicago have been completely overwhelmed, making many migrants have to camp outside of police stations. Lightfoot has also turned down the idea of housing migrants in venues and abandoned buildings, saying that she cannot disrupt businesses and that vacant buildings don’t have the proper infrastructure to humanely house the migrants. 

Lightfoot stated, “Sadly, we don’t expect the buses to stop arriving anytime soon, and importantly, we’ve seen in the last couple of weeks, a new surge of migrants coming to Chicago on a daily basis.” The state of emergency declaration is in response to the looming migrant surge that will be coming upon the expiration of Title 42, which has been previously reported on by the DC Enquirer. There have already been massive surges at the border, and that is before the expiration of the public health rule, so the upcoming crisis can only be worse. 

Lightfoot has said recently Chicago has received between 100 to 200 migrants bused to them daily. She said in a news conference that “It’s worse now and it’s going to get worse before it gets better,” and has attempted to blame Abbott for his approach. 

The mayor of the Windy City said “We will always do right by our immigrant and refugee communities, but we’ve reached a breaking point in our response to the humanitarian crisis primarily manufactured by [Abbott] for cynical purposes.” 

It is undoubtedly an unfortunate situation for Chicago residents, but one in many ways caused by the leadership and voters. When people far from the border wish to allow mass numbers of people to pour into this country, it is only right they have to live with the consequences of their choices. 

Perhaps as they begin to realize the strain an open border would have upon them and the country at large, the city of Chicago will realize the unrealistic idea of an open border is flawed and cannot safely happen. Until then, they will have to simply lie in the bed they made.