Biden wants to send migrants to NJ, report says
❓ Could thousands of migrants be relocated from NYC to NJ?
✈ President Biden suggests ACY as a possible location
😠 Local officials say the area could not handle an influx of asylum seekers
New York Mayor Eric Adams says his city has run out of room to house tens of thousands of migrants who arrived in the Big Apple seeking asylum.
President Joe Biden is now proposing to send hundreds, perhaps thousands, of migrants from New York to New Jersey.
In response to complaints from the NYC mayor, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security sent a list of 11 potential sites to Adams where as many as 60,000 migrants could be housed. All of the sites are federally owned.
Among the sites listed: Atlantic City International Airport
Bloomberg News was the first to report on the list.
Immediate pushback on Biden's migrant plan
Reaction from New Jersey officials, both Democrat and Republican, was a swift condemnation of the plan.
Atlantic City Mayor Marty Small says his city has many other urgent issues to deal with, and vowed his city would not be used a dumping ground. Small told NJ.com he was "totally opposed" to the idea.
Congressman Jeff Van Drew (NJ-2) was even more forceful.
"President Biden and his administration have continually refused to enforce our nation's rule of law," Van Drew said in a statement, "This is their mess, they deal with it and leave South Jersey out of it."
Van Drew claimed in his statement 7,000 migrants crossed the U.S. southern border on Tuesday.
"This is completely out of hand and South Jersey will not be responsible for dealing with this administration's failures," Van Drew vowed, "I call on Governor Murphy to unequivocally reject this proposal."
Murphy has been silent on migrants in Atlantic City
Gov. Phil Murphy has not commented on the report the Biden Administration was considering using Atlantic City International Airport as a place to house migrants seeking asylum.
In 2022, Murphy did vow to make New Jersey a 'sanctuary state' and said "we are absolutely prepared" to accept migrants in New Jersey.
At the time he made those comments, Republican governors of state like Florida and Texas were sending migrants that showed up in their states to states with Democratic governors.
Murphy called for a bipartisan effort to "figure out immigration in America" and urged fellow governors to "not play politics with people's live."
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