‘Overwhelming Our Small Towns’: Ohio AG Suggests Courtroom Battle To Stop Feds Dumping Migrants In State

Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost announced Monday that his office is investigating how to stop the Biden-Harris administration from continuing to resettle massive numbers of foreign nationals into his state.

An enormous increase in the migrant population in Ohio has taken place during the past four years of the Biden-Harris administration, leading to a strain in the state’s economic, medical and educational systems, Yost declared in a press release. Ohio’s top prosecutor says he is now directing his office to research courtroom strategies on how to stop the White House from sending an “unlimited” number of migrants into Ohio communities.

“How many people can they be expected to take?” the GOP attorney general asked. “What are the limits to the federal government’s power? Could the federal government simply funnel into Ohio all the millions of migrants flooding in under the current administration’s watch?”

“There’s got to be a limiting principle,” Yost continued. “We’re going to find a way to get this disaster in front of a federal judge.”

In addition to strained government resources, Yost alleged that locals in the state have complained about migrants causing car crashes, squatting in homes, killing wildlife for food and stealing property, according to the press release. He cited the town of Springfield as an example, saying the town has “swollen by more than a third” because of the migrant influx.

In a July letter addressed to GOP Sens. J.D. Vance of Ohio and Tim Scott of Florida, the city manager of Springfield said as many as 20,000 Haitian nationals had been resettled in the town in the past four years, creating a housing crisis in a community of just under 60,000 residents. The city manager appealed to the federal government for help — saying that without further assistance, towns like Springfield would fail to meet the housing needs of its communities.

Other Springfield residents have voiced concerns.

“I have men that cannot speak English in my front yard screaming at me, throwing mattresses in my front yard, throwing trash in my front yard,” one resident told the Springfield City Commission during an August meeting, according to the National Desk. The resident, referred to as Noel, said she felt “unsafe” because a number of homeless migrants were allegedly camped out in her neighborhood, and some even allegedly camped out on her yard.

“Look at me, I weigh 95 pounds,” Noel said. “I couldn’t defend myself if I had to.”

More than seven million foreign nationals have illegally crossed the U.S.-Mexico border since the beginning of the Biden-Harris administration, according to the latest data from Customs and Border Protection (CBP). The White House has also allowed roughly half a million Haitians, Cubans, Nicaraguans and Venezuelans into the country since January 2023 via a mass parole initiative known as the CHNV program.

“Ohio is a great place to work and live,” Yost continued on Monday. “But overwhelming our small towns with massive migrant populations without any coordination or assistance from the federal government is changing that in front of our eyes.”