Mayor of NYC Eric Adams thought he had it all figured out. After visiting the southern border city of El Paso, TX, and getting a more authentic look at the massive illegal immigration problem firsthand, many thought he would handle things right. In his eyes he has.
Opening the Brooklyn Cruise Terminal where a massive shelter has been erected for these illegals, Adams thought they would be happy with what they were being handed. As this is a sanctuary city, he believes it is their responsibility to look after the illegals who end up on their doorstep. Initially put at the Watson Hotel in the Hell’s Kitchen neighborhood of Manhattan, the taxpayers have been footing the bill, and now he sees it is high time to drop the cost.
Instead of leaving the hotel, the illegals have instead set up an encampment. They believe that they are owed for their struggles and their travel. They instead demand the city “cancel rent” as well as hand over the keys to “permanent homes.” With a spot just two blocks from Central Park, the homeless encampment is not only surprising, but it detracts from the usual aesthetic of the area.
Decorating the trusses outside the hotel with homemade signs, they have some interesting messages. One asks for “no to discrimination towards immigrants” while another says “We need housing to sleep, we need help please.” Somehow, the help being provided is below their expectations or what they were told they would receive.
Their arrival coupled with the squeeze on rents in NYC thanks to COVID is making an already difficult situation even more impossible for many working- and middle-class New Yorkers. The horrific cost of rent is going through the roof, and home prices have skyrocketed so much many families have been forced to move out of the area, or even state.
Since the spring of 2022, 50,000 illegals have been bussed to NYC to help the city fulfill its status as a sanctuary city. Now, these illegals will be competing with citizens and the people of NYC to sign on the dotted line for these overinflated rents. With limited housing available across the city, it’s already a tough market. When you factor in just how few are low-cost enough for the illegals to get funding for, suddenly many of the lower-income Americans are now pushed out.
Landlords and leasing agents are often more likely to take a check from a government program instead of issuing rent to a low-income private citizen. These programs guarantee they get their money on time and in full every month. Given the problems many on the poverty line have with making rent, the government-sponsored illegal is the better play for many.
In 2017 a study was published in the Journal of Housing Economics about the impacts of massive immigration on the rental ecosystem. There they discovered “increases in immigration into a metropolitan statistical area are linked with rising rents and home prices in that metropolitan statistical area and neighboring metropolitan statistical areas.”
If you’ve ever lived in or even around an area with a massive flux of low-income or illegal immigrants, you have seen how their movements can greatly impact the price of your rent. Just seeing them showing up to try and get a place to call home can send rents spiking to the top of what the government is willing to hand over.
Despite large objections to them previously, thus far many NY Congressional Republicans have remained incredibly silent on the issue. Rep. Elise Stefanik, Claudia Tenney, Nick Langworthy, Marc Molinaro, Nicole Malliotakis, Andrew Garbarino, Anthony D’Esposito, and Nick LaLota have all been mic silent since they started moving in. Considering how many photos have leaked of the illegals and how well they are dressed, it would seem as if the city is giving them far more than they give native New Yorkers.
