Since last year, upwards of 10,000 immigrants have arrived in Chicago, most of them bused there by Texas officials through no choice of their own. This has presented a challenge for Chicago, which has made itself a “sanctuary city.”
Wednesday night, in order to deal with the influx, the Chicago City Council voted 34-13 to approve $51 million for immigrant housing. But this was no long-term fix; rather, that funding is only expected to last the city through the end of June. Since January, the city has spent over $100 million on the immigrant crisis.
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And not everybody in the city was happy about the decision. At the meeting, longtime Chicago residents voiced their opposition to the funding. Fox Chicago reported, “Several groups in Chicago are asking how the city can suddenly come up with millions of dollars for new visitors, while local communities remain neglected.” Multiple people had to be escorted out of the meeting for their vocal opposition, and Mayor Brandon Johnson had to restore order after it became too raucous.
The sentiment behind the opposition makes sense. Chicago is a city that already has a million different problems. In 2022, crime spiked by 41%, and although shootings have actually slightly dropped in recent years, Chicago is still one of the top 10 cities when it comes to murders per capita. Just last weekend, 60 people were shot, and 12 were killed in holiday violence. There is also a significant homelessness problem, and dozens of schools in Chicago report zero students proficient in math or reading. Businesses are leaving the city at an alarming rate, all while it looks like taxes are about to become even more burdensome in order to raise additional revenue. In other words, Chicago is a complete mess right now.
With this reality as the backdrop, it becomes clear why it is imprudent to spend $51 million on new immigrants at the moment: There is a long list of problems that residents and community members in Chicago, the people who elected the City Council to represent them, need the help of the city to address. This becomes doubly true when one realizes that the vote sets a precedent such that when the funding expires in just one month, additional money will have to be pledged. Will we be having the same exact conversation at the end of June? Almost certainly.
Johnson wrote on Twitter, “When I came into office, I pledged that I would serve both our residents and new arrivals to the best of my ability, and I am committed to upholding that pledge.” He went on to say, “But I am just as committed to undoing the decades of disinvestment that has left parts of Chicago living in conditions that resemble Great Depression-era America. Because the cries that I hear are not about shutting others out, but about letting more of us in.”
It is true that Johnson has been put in a tough situation, and there must be something done about the immigrant crisis. This is a case in which the federal government needs to take leadership and take humane action designed for the benefit of all parties.
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But, in the end, while this is some nice sloganeering, it fails to grapple with political reality. Of course, in an ideal world, the city could fund housing for immigrants while also addressing all the other problems in the city that affect residents. However, we live in a world of scarce resources. And scarcity necessitates prioritization. There is no world in which choosing to fund one thing does not come at the expense of something else. As economist Thomas Sowell famously wrote, “There are no solutions. There are only trade-offs.”
In this case, Mayor Johnson has made his priorities clear: immigrants over residents.
Jack Elbaum is a summer 2023 Washington Examiner fellow.