Denver Cracks Down After Taking More Migrants Per Capita Than Anywhere Else

The City of Denver will begin ordering foreign national migrants in its shelter system to leave on Feb. 5 after they have spent a certain number of days in facilities, according to multiple reports.

Denver is the top destination, per capita, across the United States for foreign migrants who have crossed the country’s international border with Mexico, and been ferried to their jurisdiction by buses paid for by the State of Texas, according to a report by NBC News. Due to overcrowding, the city will begin evicting individuals who have remained in the system for 42 days, according to a Jan. 17 report by Denverite, a local news organization.

“Just yesterday [my children] started throwing away the toys, the bicycles in the common area,” said Eddi Mujica, a mother from Venezuela whose family traveled to the United States, and who has lived with them in Denver’s shelter system, to NBC. “We don’t know where we will go next,” she added, having received an eviction notice from the city.

Denver, the capital of Colorado and a city of approximately 713,000 people, is currently sheltering over 4,400 foreign migrants through contracts in hotels, Denverite reported. By September of 2023, the city had paid nearly $25 million to house migrants.

The city’s Democratic mayor, Mike Johnston, has estimated that foreign migrant housing, schooling, healthcare and other services will cost over $100 million in 2024, NBC reported. The city’s hospital system has already provided $10 million in uncompensated medical services to migrants.

Many migrants have taken to manual work to earn money to exit the system. The phenomenon of migrants washing car windows at intersections has increased, according to a report by CBS News Colorado, given that many migrants have not received employment authorization documents (EADs) from U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services.

“[W]e want to see expanded work authorization and we want the ability for these people to be able to find jobs and get paid regularly,” said Jon Ewing, an officer with Denver Human Services to CBS. “We want to give them the fighting chance to do that, but we’re limited with what we can do.”

Until then, many migrants will remain in the streets: working and, if evicted from city shelter, possibly living there. “We don’t have a way to get an apartment. What do we do?” one migrant told CBS.