


Sobering video shows dozens of migrants sleeping on cardboard outside the iconic Roosevelt Hotel in Midtown Manhattan on Monday morning — as the makeshift processing center for asylum-seekers hit capacity this weekend.
The slumbering newly arrived migrants could be seen filling the sidewalks surrounding the historic hotel at 45th Street and Vanderbilt Avenue.
The group slept shoulder-to-shoulder on the ground while waiting to be taken into the currently full city shelter as NYPD officers monitored the situation.
Heartbreaking images showed crowd-control ropes separating the migrants from passersby, as those waiting for access to proper shelter huddled under blankets with their belongings alongside them.
The 1,000-room Roosevelt Hotel, located near Grand Central terminal, had been closed for nearly three years given the COVID pandemic. It then became the city’s main “asylum-seeker arrival center” earlier this year.
The recent flood of migrants has given the Big Apple’s hotel industry a post-COVID comeback, as more than 100 hotels are now contracting with Mayor Eric Adams’ administration to fill up more 10,000 rooms with asylum-seekers.
In addition to the Roosevelt, the Holiday Inn in Manhattan’s Financial District has also been converted to a migrant shelter, while other hotels have been contracted to provide rooms for migrants on a month-to-month basis, industry insiders told The Post.
The city entered into an overall $275 million contract with the hotel association earlier this year that set aside 5,000 hotel rooms for migrants as a staggering 93,200 have arrived in the Big Apple since spring 2022 — with more than 2,500 still pouring in weekly.
Mayor Eric Adams issued yet another anguished plea for federal help last week, saying, “We have stepped up and led the nation, but this national crisis should not fall on cities alone to navigate.
“We need a national solution here,” said the mayor, who has ripped fellow Dem and President Joe Biden for not doing his part to help the dire situation.
Last week, 54 other city Democratic lawmakers sent a letter to Biden urging the White House to step up to help the city with federal assistance and better control the influx of migrants at the US-Mexico border.
Instead, team Biden offered a federal liaison — and no additional funds. The dismissive response drew backlash from local lawmakers, who complained the president was ignoring the city’s plight.
The hotel’s overflow comes as state Assemblywoman Jenifer Rajkumar (D-Queens) is set to hold a rally Monday to urge Biden to take more control of the recent influx of migrants entering the Big Apple.
Local leaders plan to call on Biden to declare a state of emergency, expedite work authorization to allow asylum-seekers to get jobs faster, better control the situation at the US-Mexico border and provide additional funding and resources to New York City.
The center set up at the Roosevelt, the first of its kind across the five boroughs, provides migrants access to legal, medical and reconnection services.
There, migrants can also be placed in a shelter or humanitarian relief center if needed.