In Chicago , they sleep on the floors of police station lobbies in such large numbers that officers have had to turn away locals seeking services. In New York City , they will soon crowd into high school gyms against the wishes of parents and students.

In Washington, they’ve filled the government-funded hotel rooms that are available and are starting to sleep on the streets.

Illegal immigrants in Democrat-run cities across the country are straining the resources and patience of leaders for whom the border crisis was, until recently, an abstract concept.

Gov. Greg Abbott, a Texas Republican, led the way in busing thousands of immigrants to so-called sanctuary cities, or jurisdictions that pledge not to cooperate with federal immigration authorities, starting last year. Gov. Ron DeSantis (R-FL) and then-Gov. Doug Ducey (R-AZ) also began busing immigrants north. Ducey’s successor, Gov. Katie Hobbs (D-AZ), has continued the practice of busing.

Now the overflow of immigrants in big cities has caused local residents and businesses to suffer as money and space to help the asylum-seekers run out.

The situation is particularly desperate in New York City, where more than 41,000 illegal immigrants are relying on city services.

Officials said Thursday that nearly half of all the midsize hotels in the city are housing illegal immigrants and warned that the city is imminently running out of space to put the new arrivals.

Facing that housing crunch, New York officials have begun to get creative.

Mayor Eric Adams ’s plan to take over 20 school gymnasiums and turn them into immigrant shelters was met with outrage from parents. At one Brooklyn school where the gym conversion process was already underway this week, children were told they could no longer play outside on the playground after class because of the incoming immigrants.

City officials also placed asylum-seekers at an old police academy and reopened an out-of-business hotel in Manhattan to accommodate the continuing influx of arrivals.

Counties surrounding New York City have fought back against another part of Adams’s plan to relieve the pressure on city resources: sending buses of illegal immigrants to the suburbs.

At least two counties have declared emergencies or sought protection in court to stop the arrival of illegal immigrants that the city is attempting to put in hotels outside its jurisdiction.

That hasn’t stopped officials from successfully placing some immigrants elsewhere in the state.

In Newburgh, New York, one couple had to scramble to find lodging for 60 of their wedding guests after the hotel at which they’d reserved rooms for their guests canceled the deal in order to make room for the illegal immigrants — two weeks before the wedding.

Some of the businesses around the New York City hotels that have filled with immigrants have reported dramatic revenue losses in the months since the asylum-seekers arrived.

The owners of several restaurants and gift shops that make most of their money off the tourists who typically stay at the hotels told the New York Post that business has dried up since the illegal immigrants displaced their customers, and some have had to lay off workers as a result.

Chicago is also struggling to manage the crisis.

With at least 100 immigrants arriving per day, Chicago’s shelters have filled up , and police stations are now serving as temporary housing for the newcomers.

Immigrant families are sleeping on the floors of police station lobbies while they wait for space at a shelter to become available. In at least one station, the New York Times reported , officers have had to send local residents in search of help to other precincts because their lobby was overflowing with illegal immigrants.

Chicago leaders’ plan to reopen a shuttered school in the South Shore neighborhood, a predominantly black community, to use as a migrant shelter has been met with fierce pushback from residents.

Residents had been working to turn the school into a community center, and at a public meeting last week, they told city leaders their own neighborhood was in need of the funding and attention being given to the illegal immigrants.

Many argued the city should place the immigrants instead in the more affluent North Side of Chicago and not in their low-income neighborhood.

In Washington, D.C., hotels paid for by taxpayers are filled to capacity with illegal immigrants. Abbott has sent buses of immigrants to Union Station and to the Naval Observatory, where Vice President Kamala Harris resides.

The district's newly created migrant services office stopped taking new arrivals earlier this month because it had run out of space and money for them, even though asylum-seekers have continued to arrive. In addition to the arrivals on state-sponsored buses, immigrants have begun to come on their own accord as well.

Part of the problem in Washington mirrors one that other big cities have encountered: Officials have struggled to find affordable housing for immigrants in the pricey market. Illegal immigrants have also had a difficult time finding jobs, meaning that a solution intended to be short-term (putting immigrants in hotel rooms) has ended up looking more like an indefinite arrangement for many families.

Washington is expected to spend more than $50 million on migrant services by the fall, which would compound existing budget problems facing the district.