Another busload of border-crossers from Texas arrived in the Big Apple on Sunday morning — as a top city official ripped the Lone Star State governor’s policy and a former New York gov called it “brilliant.”
Thirty-one mask-wearing, young-adult migrants got off a white bus about 7 a.m. at Manhattan’s Port Authority Bus Terminal amid the ongoing public war of words between GOP Texas Gov. Greg Abbott and Dem Mayor Eric Adams’ administration about the bused border-crossers.
City Hall’s head of immigrant affairs, Manuel Castro, on Sunday said the latest “bus full of asylum seekers coming from Texas” was part of a shameful “political ploy.
“We have serious issues about the way Gov. Abbott is treating asylum-seekers, especially because this is supposed to be a voluntary bus ride, and it appears that it’s not,” Castro told reporters at the Manhattan facility.
The commissioner was apparently referencing reports about sick and unfed migrants, as well as those who were forced to come directly to New York City without stopping despite asking to get off the bus in Tennessee.
“We’re calling into question what Gov. Abbott is doing. This is a political ploy,” Castro said.
“We’ll talk to individuals, we’ll find out more,” he said. “In previous buses, people were sick, hungry, they had been through a lot. … There have been a lot of issues on the way here. As you may have heard, one individual, or many individuals, wanted to get off earlier, but the bus [driver] was refusing to.”
The influx of migrants — many of whom are reportedly pursuing political asylum in the US — to the five boroughs has left city officials scrambling to provide shelter for the homeless newcomers, which is required by law.
But ex-New York Gov. David Paterson, a Democrat, said he is impressed by Abbott’s political maneuvering, explaining that it put Adams in a bind.
“The governor of Texas, Greg Abbott, has come up with … one of the most brilliant political strategies I’ve heard in a long time,” Paterson said during an appearance on WABC 770’s “Cats Roundtable” that aired Sunday.
“I’m a Democrat. And there are a lot of things I don’t like about what he is doing. However, sometimes you have to tip your cap to your opponent.
“It has really paid dividends to him politically,” Paterson said of Abbott. “In addition, it has put New York’s Mayor Eric Adams in the position where he can’t say he won’t accept the immigrants.
“That would be going against what has been the policy most Democrats have on immigration in the first place. And if [Adams] sends the immigrants back to Texas, he is … going against his own attempt to get the federal government to help pay for the fact that they are here.”
A City Hall rep said Sunday’s bused-in migrants are originally from Venezuela and Colombia. The city joined volunteers in providing them with food, water and clothing, as well as legal and medical assistance, the representative said.
Many of the migrants will eventually head to final destinations in New Jersey, North Carolina, Chicago and Kentucky, with volunteers helping to get them there, the rep said.
Abbott’s press office did not respond to a request for comment.
Paterson said that while the situation puts Adams in a bind, he doesn’t think it has harmed him politically.
“I don’t think Adams is being hurt in this process at all,” the former governor told host John Catsimatidis. “But I think nationally, it’s an amazing way to focus people on the whole immigration process.”
