[Adapted from the latest Radio Derb, now available exclusively on VDARE.com]

Eric Adams, the mayor of New York City, is in a bind. He’s a black Democrat, dependably on board with all the policies favored by progressives plus a side order of corruption [New York Mayor Eric Adams faces nepotism claim after reports he appointed his brother to a $240,000 NYPD job, by Joshua Zitser, Business Insider, January 10, 2022]. One of those policies, however, is causing serious strain to his city’s budget. That would be the open Southern border that both major parties favor.

Given that immigration is a national issue, mayors of border cities and governors of border states understandably believe that the downsides of an Open Border should be spread nationwide, not concentrated in their localities. Overwhelmed with illegal border crossers, they have been flying and busing them elsewhere, mainly to the big cities that illegals want to go to: New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, Denver, and Washington, D.C.

Since this started in a big way last spring, New York City has taken in sixty thousand illegals, putting up most of them in hotels and city-run shelters, at a cost of close to a billion dollars [Eric Adams wants FEMA to ban cities from busing migrants to NYC—as 1,300 arrive this week alone, by Bernadette Hogan and Emily Crane, NY Post, April 27, 2023].

Two weeks ago, His Honor went to Washington, D.C. to beg for more federal funds to help deal with the crisis. He didn’t get smacked down as hard as his predecessor Abe Beame did under the Gerry Ford administration, in a different fiscal crisis 48 years ago—the episode that inspired the New York Daily News to the memorable front-page headline: FORD TO CITY: DROP DEAD [October 30, 1975]. Adams wasn’t satisfied, though, saying, according to the NY Post, above:

The issue is not the asylum seeker. The issue is the fact that the national government is not doing its job.

What is the federal government’s job, according to Mayor Adams? Its job is, one, to give his city a wad of federal money to help look after all the illegals, and two, to give them all permission to work so they won’t be indigent [Mayor Adams Urges Biden Administration to Provide Expedited, Emergency Paths to Work Authorization for Asylum Seekers Ahead of Title 42 Lifting, NYC.gov, April 19, 2023].

Why doesn’t Hizzoner ask the feds to send ICE agents in force to round up and incarcerate all the illegals until they can be deported, as federal law not only allows but requires?

Why? Need you ask? New York is a Sanctuary City. New York welcomes illegal aliens.

And in any case, as Adams surely knows, at the first signs of a mass arrest a mighty host of lawyers would descend upon the city to block the arrests with legal niceties.

And you can of course quibble with my usage of the word ”illegal.” The policy of the Biden administration towards illegal border crossers is to declare them legal, more precisely pseudo-legal, by executive action. As a headline in the April 29th New York Post put it: Mayorkas tells migrants: Don’t break the law! That’s my job! [by George Fishman]

Although the New York Post was being a bit too kind to the border-jumpers there. A few days later—just today, in fact—it ran an illuminating report by veteran border watcher Todd Bensman, writing about the particular case of Venezuelans, one of the biggest nationalities in the Biden Border Rush of the past two years.

A high proportion of these Venezuelans left Venezuela after the country’s economic and political collapse ten years ago, relocating to safe third countries like Colombia, Brazil, Ecuador, Chile and Argentina. They’d settled into comfortable, even prosperous lives in those third countries. Then, hearing from friends and relatives that the USA is wide open, they’ve decided to head up here.

Quote from Bensman:

Many will eventually have to lie on government forms or to government agents about where they’ve really been, a lie that is a federal crime that can bring up to five years in prison if ever investigated.

So my usage of the word ”illegal” in these cases is certainly justified.

And of course their lies never will be investigated. Where immigration is concerned, our laws are a joke.

You sometimes see people ask, in comment threads or Letters to the Editor, why Congress doesn’t do something: pass laws that are stricter, less easily gamed by the Executive.

Answer: Both parties in Congress want the border open—Republicans to feed cheap labor to their donors, Democrats to appease their race lobbies.

There could of course be impeachment of federal officials like Mayorkas who are breaking our laws; but you won’t be seeing any impeachment efforts out of the Uniparty.

Back to New York’s mayor Eric Adams. As I said, he’s in a bind. He’s frustrated. What does a progressive black politician do when he’s frustrated?

He cries RACISM!

Last weekend Greg Abbott, the white Republican governor of Texas, announced that he would continue busing illegals to New York, Chicago, and Washington, D.C. Governor Abbott further announced that he would start busing illegals to Los Angeles and Denver, too.

Apprised of this, Mayor Adams on Monday issued a press release containing the following:

Not only is this behavior morally bankrupt and devoid of any concern for the well-being of asylum seekers, but it is also impossible to ignore the fact that Abbott is now targeting five cities run by Black mayors. Put plainly, Abbott is using this crisis to hurt Black-run cities.

[Mayor Adams’ Statement on Governor Abbott’s Decision to Resume Busing of Asylum Seekers to Five Democratic Cities With Black Mayors, NYC.gov, May 1, 2023]

It’s all about race, see? The white demons are trying to put down the black man!

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”Patriotism is the last refuge of a scoundrel,” said Dr. Johnson. In today’s USA, an accusation of Republican racism is the last refuge of a Democrat politician being shafted by his own party.

And this particular accusation doesn’t hold water. Since the busing began last spring Texas has sent 5,200 illegals to New York. The city of El Paso has separately and independently sent more than twice as many: 10,713 [ Mayor Adams denies calling Greg Abbott racist after alleging Texas gov targeted ‘black-run cities,’ by MaryAnn Martinez, Bernadette Hogan and Jesse O’Neill, NY Post, May 2, 2023].

The mayor of El Paso, Oscar Leeser, is a Democrat and… white with, if I’m not mistaken, blue eyes.

Next Thursday, May 11th, the Title 42 COVID rule ends and it’s widely predicted that there’ll be a mighty surge of illegals over the border. There are said to be forty thousand camped on the Mexican side, waiting.

So, Mister Mayor, if you think the white devils have been racistly making trouble for you, you ain’t seen nothing yet.

John Derbyshire [email him] writes an incredible amount on all sorts of subjects for all kinds of outlets. (This no longer includes National Review, whose editors had some kind of tantrum and fired him.) He is the author of We Are Doomed: Reclaiming Conservative Pessimism and several other books. He has had two books published by VDARE.com com: FROM THE DISSIDENT RIGHT (also available in Kindle) and FROM THE DISSIDENT RIGHT II: ESSAYS 2013.

For years he’s been podcasting at Radio Derb, now available at VDARE.com for no charge. His writings are archived at JohnDerbyshire.com.

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