Gov. Hochul said Thursday that she had sent a letter to the White House asking for more support for migrants pouring into New York City, placing responsibility for the crisis at President Biden’s feet in her first major address on the issue.
But the speech from Hochul — who did not commit new state funds and said she would not force upstate communities to take migrants — drew a mixed reaction from some city officials and met a lengthy, frustrated statement from Mayor Adams.
Speaking from the state Capitol building on the day her governorship entered its third year, the governor insisted the state does not have good options to handle the situation without more federal support.
“Barring much-needed changes at the border, there does not appear to be a solution,” Hochul said in a 10-minute speech. “This crisis originated with the federal government, and it must be resolved through the federal government.”
Hochul, who faces growing political pressure to help the city with the crisis, stopped short of making any significant new state commitments in the speech. The state has allocated about $1.5 billion to support the migrants, the governor said.
Her three-page letter to Biden asks the federal government to deliver more funds, expedite migrants’ work papers and provide more spaces to serve as shelters.
In her speech, Hochul said New York has “countless unfilled jobs that are begging for someone to just take them.”
“Our quest continues to squarely tell the White House: Let them work,” Hochul said of the arrivals.
The White House did not immediately reply to requests for comment.
Adams, who has called on the state to pitch in more resources and to force upstate municipalities to welcome migrants, said in a statement that he was “gratified to hear” Hochul call for federal action but “disappointed that the state today appears to minimize the role that they can — and must — play.”
“Leaving New York City alone to manage this crisis — and abdicating the state’s responsibility to coordinate a statewide response — is unfair to New York City,” Adams added.
Hochul’s speech carried echoes of Adams’ long-running calls for a more active White House response, though the governor avoided using the sharp language sometimes deployed by the mayor. In April, Adams said Biden had “failed New York City.”
Later, Adams dropped off Biden’s team of 2024 campaign surrogates. Hochul joined the squad.
More than 100,000 asylum seekers have arrived in New York City since spring 2022, according to city government figures, and about 60,000 remain in the city’s care. In a year, the count of people sleeping in the city’s over-stretched shelter system has roughly doubled.
Many of the migrants fled political and economic turmoil in Central and South America.
With waves of arrivals showing no signs of abating, the Adams administration has said city support for the migrants may cost $12 billion by 2025. And over several days beginning last month, a crowd of asylum seekers slept outside an intake center at the Roosevelt Hotel in Midtown Manhattan.
In the last two weeks, the city has opened state-funded megashelters at a parking lot belonging to the Creedmoor Psychiatric Center in eastern Queens and another on Randalls Island. Combined, the shelters are expected to house about 4,000 people.
City Hall has also urged Hochul to use executive powers to override county-level orders intended to block the movement of migrants, an approach supported by advocates for the homeless but spurned by the governor.
“We cannot and will not force other parts of our state to shelter migrants,” Hochul said in her Thursday remarks.
Some progressives pounced. “I’m very disappointed to see the governor’s unwillingness to compel jurisdictions outside NYC to do the right thing,” Antonio Reynoso, the liberal Brooklyn borough president, said in a statement.
And Adams said upstate counties must have the same legal responsibilities to the migrants as the city, which for four decades has been required to provide shelter to the homeless under a consent decree premised on a provision of the state Constitution.
“Whatever differences we all may have about how to handle this crisis, we believe what is crystal clear is that whatever obligations apply under state law to the City of New York apply with equal force to every county across New York state,” Adams said in his statement.
As Adams has pressed Hochul for more state support, tension has seemed to boil between the two moderate Democrats, who are aligned on many issues and take pride in their warm public relationship.
Their handling of the crisis is under the microscope in a Manhattan Supreme Court case centered on the city’s right-to-shelter responsibilities. In court filings, the city and state have traded criticisms and gripes, each painting the other’s approach as insufficient.
But on Thursday, Hochul turned her focus to the president, pleading for more help.
“The reality is, we’ve managed thus far without substantive support from Washington,” the governor said. “New York has shouldered this burden for far too long.”
