New York City official: Fewer charter buses from the south arriving with immigrants, but thousands keep coming

Fewer charter buses of asylum-seeking migrants are being sent to New York City by southern border states protesting President Joe Biden’s immigration policies, according to a deputy mayor overseeing the city’s response.

Nevertheless, thousands of migrants are continuing to arrive weekly — via other means — due to the city’s welcoming approach, the deputy mayor, Anne Williams-Isom, said Wednesday.

"Most of the asylum-seekers that are coming into the city right now are actually not coming from buses,” she said, adding: “On some days we don’t get any buses that are coming from south of the border.”

Instead, migrants are showing up at airports and at city intake centers, she has said.

In the past, eight or nine charter buses would arrive daily at the Port Authority Bus Terminal in Manhattan after a journey of thousands of miles from the south. But now, she said of migrants, “They might be in other parts of the United States, they’re hearing about New York City and what they get when they come to New York City.”

“Since we have a front door that is open, people are finding themselves here,” Williams-Isom said, speaking at a briefing at City Hall.

The city provides shelter, food, ID cards, health and mental services as well as schooling for kids, and more. Since the crisis began last spring, more than 87,200 migrants have arrived in the city. Late last month there began to be more migrants in the city’s shelter system than homeless New Yorkers.

The city is under a decades-old, rare judicial mandate to provide shelter to whoever needs it. Mayor Eric Adams has said the cost by next summer is estimated to top $4.3 billion.

By far the state sending the most migrants to the city is Texas. Texas Gov. Greg Abbott’s press office didn’t answer questions Wednesday about any change in the busing program, but the office sent a statement from press secretary Andrew Mahaleris saying: “Until President Biden steps up and does his job to secure the border, Texas will continue busing migrants to self-declared sanctuary cities like New York City.”

By Matthew Chayes

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Matthew Chayes, a Newsday reporter since 2007, covers New York City.