The massive wave of illegal immigration coming across the U.S.-Mexico border is hitting Illinois and Chicago particularly hard, with authorities considering a plan to erect giant “refugee” tent cities to handle the influx. More than 1,500 migrants are currently staying in police stations across Chicago and ten times that many are spread across 16 shelters operated by the city.
Speaking to the media prior to formal discussions with the city council as busses filled with migrants continued pouring into the city, far-left Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson painted a dark picture of the situation facing local authorities. “We have had more buses show up in the last 15 weeks than all of last year combined,” he said. “This is our reality.”
Johnson also outlined his vision for what to do as winter approaches. “We are moving with expediency because the weather is going to be shifting very soon, so before inclement weather sets in, we fully expect to have these base camps established,” the mayor added. The Associated Press reported that taxpayers were paying about $30 million per month to house the new arrivals around the city.
The mayor also warned that a failure to support his plan would make matters even worse. “The type of chaos that will break out as a result of not having any action will cost the city much more,” Johnson told ABC7.
Speaking to the Chicago Sun-Times, the mayor echoed that warning. Noting that many of the migrants were “desperate,” Johnson said the city had to act quickly to create infrastructure to “support and, quite frankly, contain these individuals.” “That type of desperation will lead to chaos,” he added as a number of migrants were recently arrested for threatening or beating police officers.
Other local officials were less enthusiastic about the mayor’s proposed plan. Alderman Andre Vasquez, for instance, was quoted in media reports saying the giant tent camps were “not the best look.” “The bigger problem is we keep getting people arriving,” continued Vasquez. “The federal government has to step up.”
The city already has an estimated 64,000 Chicagoans without permanent housing, according to news reports. Countless homeless Americans who were sleeping at the Chicago O’Hare airport have been kicked out to make room for illegal immigrants, who are now sleeping on floors and benches throughout the facility, Fox News reported recently.
The crisis afflicting Chicago has its roots in the Biden administration’s immigration and open-border policies. Multiple officials from previous administrations have warned that the White House appears to be deliberately erasing the border and flooding the country with illegal immigrants for subversive reasons.
Estimates suggest more than 5 million have crossed just since Biden took office. That number continues to grow daily. And instead of focusing on getting the situation under control, the White House and the scandal-plagued U.S. Department of Justice are suing and terrorizing state officials and property owners working to slow the invasion.
Last year, former U.S. Customs and Border Protection Chief Mark Morgan told this writer that the Biden administration wanted the border wide open for political reasons. He said the crisis was helping human traffickers while undermining U.S. national security. “It’s disgusting,” Morgan said, praising Texas officials for doing what they could to stem the tide even in the face of federal opposition.
More recently, former U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) chief and Border 911 founder Thomas Homan told this writer that among the more than 5 million illegal immigrants who have flooded across the border so far were numerous Communist Chinese military operatives and Islamic jihadists. He also said the Biden administration was lying to the American people and Congress about it all.
States like Illinois and cities like Chicago, which bill themselves as “sanctuaries” for illegal immigrants, are not helping the crisis, critics say. Not content to just be a “sanctuary” state, though, Illinois politicians are rolling out the red carpet, approving a new law this summer that will allow illegal immigrants to serve as police officers.
U.S. Rep. Mary Miller (R-Illinois) blasted the move. “At 5 p.m. yesterday, when no one was paying attention, [Governor J.B.] Pritzker signed a bill to allow illegal immigrants to become police officers, giving non-citizens the power to arrest citizens in our state,” she wrote on social media. “No sane state would allow foreign nationals to arrest their citizens, this is madness!”
The Illinois Fraternal Order of Police, meanwhile, said this would harm law enforcement. “What message does this legislation send when it allows people who do not have legal status to become the enforcers of our laws?” the group said. “This is a potential crisis of confidence in law enforcement at a time when our officers need all the public confidence they can get.”
New York City is facing a similar crisis as its Democrat mayor scrambles to stop the flow into his overwhelmed jurisdiction. Just last week, Mayor Eric Adams — once a full-blown advocate of his city’s “sanctuary” status for illegal immigrants — warned at a townhall that the escalating immigration crisis would “destroy” the Big Apple.
“I’m gonna tell you something, New Yorkers, never in my life have I had a problem that I didn’t see an ending to,” he said, blasting the Biden administration for creating the crisis and doing nothing to help address it. “I don’t see an ending to this.” Every community and every government “service” in New York City is going to be “impacted,” Adams warned.
By contrast, Florida has been passing tough laws aimed at cracking down on illegal immigration, including requirements that employers verify the legal status of employees. According to the president of a roofing company cited by the far-left New York Times, that alone has boosted wages for legal workers in Florida by about 10 percent so far.
“The state of Florida needs to do what it can to stand up to Joe Biden’s open border policy and protect Floridians from the massive cost of illegal immigration,” said Florida Rep. Randy Fine, a Republican who supported the legislation. “The purpose of the law is to get illegal immigrants to stop coming to Florida and to get those who are here to leave.”
The latest data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics show that over 1.2 million U.S.-born workers lost their jobs last month. Meanwhile, almost 700,000 new foreign-born workers entered the job market as the border remains wide open and the Biden Department of Justice goes after companies that prioritize hiring Americans.
Of course, there is nothing “humanitarian” about the escalating existential crisis instigated by the federal government at the border and now all over the nation. State governments, Congress and the courts must tackle this engineered tsunami of illegal immigration or America will be facing a catastrophe of unprecedented proportions. Time is short.
This article was originally published at the Illinois Family Institute: Immigration Tsunami Swallows Illinois, “Refugee Tent Cities” Planned