Gov. Maura Healey is about to help elect Peter Durant.

Who?

Peter Durant. He is a previously obscure Republican state rep from Spencer who represents Worcester in the State House of Representatives.

He is now running in a Worcester special election to succeed Democrat state Sen. Anne Gobi, a fellow obscure legislator from Spencer, who resigned to take a job with the Healey administration.

But that is not the story. The story is that Durant is championing an issue that no Democrats will touch.

And that is to urge Healey, a progressive Democrat, to file legislation to repeal Massachusetts’ “right to shelter” law that has become a magnet for thousands of illegal immigrants pouring into Massachusetts.

Durant to date is the only public official, Democrat or Republican, to openly take on Healey over the illegal immigrant issue.

“Our homeless shelters are maxed out,” Durant said. “Hotels across the state have been converted to shelters,”

“Worse yet, all this assistance is being taken away from our legal residents.” He added that it was time to stop Massachusetts from being a “magnet state.”

Durant’s appeal will go nowhere, not with the governor and not with the Democrat controlled Legislature. In fact, Healey shot it down right away. But at least Durant brought it up.

Massachusetts is the only state in the country with a “right to shelter “ law which guarantees shelter and subsistence for homeless families.

“They’re here because Massachusetts has and will always be a beacon of hope, compassion, humanity and opportunity,” Healey said.

That may be true, but it is costing Massachusetts taxpayers $45 million a month to house and support them, and more are coming every day, which is why Healey last week declared a state of emergency.

Contrary to its implementation today, the shelter law, signed into law in 1983 by liberal Gov. Michael Dukakis, was designed to deal with the homelessness of Massachusetts residents, not the horde of illegal immigrants now flooding into the state.

Word has no doubt gotten out that Massachusetts, with its generous government assistance policies, is as good a deal as an illegal immigrant family can get—free food, free housing, free medical care, free schooling and drivers licenses.

Resources to house illegal immigrant families have become so strained, however, that Healey is seeking federal funding from the Biden administration as well as the authorization of work permits for the immigrants.

Her emergency declaration also allows Healey to more quickly call up the National Guard, bypass normal procurement regulations for contractors and vendors, and enable her to appeal to the president for disaster relief money.

Some 5,600 immigrant families are now housed in the state’s emergency shelter system, which is 80% higher than a year ago, with 10 to 30 new immigrant families are arriving every day.

The governor’s Office of Housing said most of the families were in state shelters and nearly 1,900 families were lodged in hotels and motels. The children of these families, most of who do not speak English, will be attending local schools next month, adding to the problem.

The situation is so bad that Lt. Gov. Kim Driscoll, who always echoes Healey, called on families take in immigrants. “If you have an extra room or suite in your home, please consider hosting a family,” Ditto Driscoll said.

Healey, in the closest she has come to criticizing the Biden administration, said in a letter to Homeland Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas that Massachusetts could no longer deal with “a federal crisis of inaction that is many years in the making.”

Healey would have been better off writing to Dear Abby. She might have at least gotten an answer.

But Mayorkas is not the problem. He only does what he is told.

The problem is Joe Biden. He opened the border and let millions of illegal immigrants from across the world walk into the country. Now they are here and on the dole. And more are on the way. Biden created the problem and then waked away from it.

Everybody knows that but few, if any, Democrats will say it.

Nor can Healey.  She is campaigning for Biden.

Peter Lucas is a veteran Massachusetts political reporter and columnist.