The migration crisis on the border with Mexico has already reached the capital of the United States.
The mayor of Washington DC called for National Guard troops to be activated to help process groups of migrants who have been arriving by bus in the US capital for days.
Some 4,800 undocumented people have arrived from the southern border, something that the mayor, the Democrat Muriel Bowserdescribes as a “humanitarian crisis” that has brought the city to a “tipping point”.
The bus trips were organized in Texas and Arizonaborder states dominated by Republicans, as a protest against the border policies of the Democrat administration Joe Bidenclassified as lax.
The president’s decisions come against the backdrop of a record increase in migration across the US-Mexico border.
Given this, some southern states have described the current federal government as “incapable” of handling the situation.
In fact, the governor of Texas, Greg Abbottone of the president’s most vocal critics, offered state-funded bus rides to Washington last April for migrants released by authorities.
The Governor of Arizona, Doug Duceydid the same a month later, arguing that the voluntary bus rides were necessary due to “little action or assistance from the federal government.”
Both Republican officials had unsuccessfully pushed for Biden to maintain a Trump-era policy that allowed the border patrol to expel nearly all irregular migrants seeking asylum.
The Texas bus program, which the White House has criticized as a “publicity stunt,” has cost taxpayers in the state more than $1,400 per passenger, according to an investigation by Dallas-based television station KXAS. .
“Crisis”
In letters to the president and his secretary of defense, Washington Mayor Bowser says members of the National Guard must be activated indefinitely to deal with a “crisis that we hope will escalate.”
“Bus arrival rates have reached tipping points,” he wrote.
“With promises from Texas and Arizona to continue these heinous operations indefinitely, the situation is dire and we view this as a humanitarian crisis, one that could overwhelm our social support network without immediate and sustained federal intervention.”
Governor Ducey responded on Twitter: “Mayor Bowser laments 4,000 migrants: Arizona had 43,570 border encounters in June alone.”
Meanwhile, the senator from Texas Ted Cruza Republican, said: “If 4,000 is a tipping point, what the hell do you call the three and a half million illegal immigrants who have crossed our southern border?”
Immigrants arriving in DC rely heavily on local humanitarian aid organizations, which provide them with food, housing, and jobs.
Washington is a sanctuary city, one of many Democratic-led jurisdictions across the country that limits its cooperation with federal immigration law enforcement.
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