New York City Mayor Eric Adams has garnered national attention in recent weeks for his criticism of the Biden administration over immigration. It turns out that many migrants are arriving in the Big Apple and applying for asylum at rates he can't control, so he has complained repeatedly. Faced with this situation, Greg Abbott decided to mock Adams, because, according to him, he "could not last a week in Texas."
The Texas governor appeared on Fox News to respond to Adams, who had previously called him a "madman" for sending buses with migrants to New York City. "When I first heard that, I thought about Frank Sinatra singing 'New York, New York,' when he's saying, 'If I can make it here, I can make it anywhere,'" he began with a laugh.
He then mocked the Democratic mayor for constant complaints about the number of migrants arriving in the city. Abbott argues that Adams has a minuscule problem compared to the one he faces in the Lone Star State. "Well, the mayor may have made it to be mayor of New York, but he could not last a week in Texas. They have so few migrants in New York compared to what we deal with every single day."
WATCH: Gov. Greg Abbott fires back at Eric Adams over migrants: “Couldn't last a week in Texas” pic.twitter.com/cSaT3PMtkO
— TV News Now (@TVNewsNow) September 12, 2023
Adams, who was elected in 2021 precisely because of his tough rhetoric against crime, asked the federal government for more money to deal with the situation. However, as reported by The Hill, NYC received about $140 million for shelters, more than any other city outside the southwest border.
According to Adams, if the current immigration situation is not stopped it will "destroy" the City. At the same time, his office noted that 110,000 asylum applications arrived in the Big Apple since the spring of 2022.
In a bout of irony, Abbott also took the opportunity to comment on cities that previously encouraged immigration too much but then cannot control the influx. "What's maddening is the fact that in New York and Chicago and D.C. and LA and other places, they put out policies self-proclaiming that they are sanctuary cities, and they love to promote these liberal ideologies until they have to actually live up and apply them. It's clear that the policies of sanctuary city and letting everyone live for free simply do not work."
September 11 and immigration policy
To mark the 22nd anniversary of the September 11 attacks, Mayor Adams gave an interview on CBS to address the issue. During the conversation, the interviewer asked him specifically if the president and the federal government should remember the lessons of September 11 when determining border policy, to which Adams responded with a resounding "yes."
"Yes, it should. As we allow people to come in to experience the American dream, we have done that for years, there's a reason the Statue of Liberty sits in our harbor. But as we romanticize that, we have to also see exactly what does that mean and how do we do it, to filter out those who are not coming here to pursue the American dream but to destroy the American dream. Everyone that attempts to enter our country is not coming here because they believe in America. Some are coming because they want to harm America. And that's the smallest number, but we cannot ignore them because it only took a certain small number of people to take down our center of trade."
Finally, he called for immigration policy reform to secure the border and help cities that can't control the number of migrants who want to enter. "Well, to remind the president and Congress [of] real border and immigration reform, and no city should be impacted by this: El Paso, Brownsville, Texas; Los Angeles; Chicago. No cities should have to burden the national crisis on its own, and we should think about that."
