Mayor Eric Adams warned President Joe Biden on Thursday that continued federal inaction on New York City's migrant crisis will eventually "decimate" the city, which he claimed is the "economic engine" of the United States.
Adams urged federal officials to send money and resources to the country's most populous city in order to help with funding for housing and food for asylum-seekers. Nearly 100,000 immigrants have arrived in New York City since the spring of 2022, and Adams predicted the price of the migrant crisis on the city could reach $12 billion by 2025 if the flow of immigrants remains the same.
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“New York City is the economic engine of this entire state and country," Adams told CBS Mornings on Thursday. "If you decimate this city, you’re going to decimate the foundation of what’s happening. ... What you saw at Roosevelt a few days ago is because the dam finally burst."
Officials are scrambling to house more than 57,000 asylum seekers currently in New York City’s care — and @NYCMayor says it will cost $12 billion: “Every day we are juggling where are we going to find another place so human beings don’t sleep on the streets.” pic.twitter.com/s7T7CW5HkM
— CBS Mornings (@CBSMornings) August 10, 2023
The statement comes after images of immigrants sleeping on the streets outside of the Roosevelt Hotel gained a lot of traction last week. The immigrants were on the streets because of a housing shortage and lack of beds for asylum-seekers. The hotel is now a migrant shelter and intake center.
The city has also become one of several targets for conservative governors of U.S. states on the country's southern border with Mexico. More than half of those recent arrivals remain reliant on the city, staying in roughly 200 emergency shelters, mega-relief centers, and smaller, short-term respite facilities.
Adams claimed that pressure needed to be placed on the "national government" in order to fix immigration problems and ensure that actual reform occurs.
"The pressure needs to be on our national government. If we look at one side of the aisle, and not the other side of the aisle, the national government needs to make sure we have true immigration reform and handle the crisis we are dealing with right now," Adams said.
The Democratic mayor also dodged placing the entire blame on the current administration, claiming the blame could be attributed to more than one person.
"Republicans have been blocking real immigration reform," Adams said. "We're also seeing that FEMA is using dollars on the southern border to allow people to bus people to New York City."
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The warning also comes a day after Adams called on the president to declare the migrant crisis in the city a "state of emergency," which would help speed up federal funding. The Biden administration has allocated $140 million to help the city with the crisis, and the state has allocated $1 billion to help the city in its budget so far.
Adams is also expected to sit down with Biden aide Tom Perez, who serves as the director of intergovernmental affairs at the White House, on Thursday afternoon, according to the New York Post.