Biden’s Border Fiasco Costing Local Taxpayers Billions
That’s why big-city mayors are whining
By Andrew R. Arthur on May 4, 2023
In a recent op-ed in the New York Post, I explained why Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot’s (D) anger toward Texas Governor Greg Abbott (R) over his renewed plans to bus migrants released by DHS at the Southwest border are misplaced. It’s not Abbott’s fault he’s sending those migrants north; Biden’s feckless “catch and release” policies at the Southwest border are to blame for those migrants’ presence here to begin with. That said, I understand Lightfoot’s frustration, given that those Biden policies are costing cities and towns across the country tens to hundreds of billions in taxpayer dollars.
NYC’s Costs. Lightfoot was not alone in her grumblings, as New York City Mayor Eric Adams (D) was also busy firing his own peppery rockets (similarly misaimed) in Abbott’s direction over the migrants headed Gotham’s way.
Fortunately for analysis purposes, however, NYC does a better job than most cities and towns of quantifying the costs those migrants impose on its municipal coffers. Those costs were included in a March report from the city’s comptroller, captioned “Accounting for Asylum Seekers, Overview of City Budgeting and Contracting to Provide Services for New Arrivals”.
In that report, the comptroller explains that different migrant demographic groups impose differing per diem costs on the city’s fisc: NYC’s tab for single adults is $184 per day, while families with children cost the city $339 per day.
https://cis.org/Arthur/Bidens-Border-Fiasco-Costing-Local-Taxpayers-Billions
