Greg Abbott: Boogeyman

Sanctuary politicians diverting attention away from themselves and their unpopular policies.

In August of 2023, Democrat Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson appeared on MSNBC to help host Al Sharpton blame the tsunami of illegals flooding his city on Texas Governor Greg Abbott’s racism.

Prompted by Sharpton’s complaint about the migrant crisis putting a tremendous burden on Black mayors, Johnson replied, “You’re absolutely right about the intentions of Gov. Abbott. He is attacking democratically-run cities and particularly cities that are being led by Black leaders or leaders-of-color. This is unconscionable. I mean, it’s a very raggedy approach. And quite frankly, not only is it reckless and raggedy, but it is evil-spirited.”

New York City Mayor Eric Adams was a bit kinder to Abbott, saying New York’s illegal migrant crisis “started with a madman down in Texas who decided he wanted to bus people up to New York City.”

Better to be a “madman” than “evil-spirited” generally, although I suppose it’s not uncommon to be both.

Illinois Governor J.B. Pritzker recently added to the Abbott pile-on with a public letter asking Texas to hold off from relieving itself from any of the illegals who are overburdening that state until Illinois experiences warm weather:“Please, while winter is threatening vulnerable people’s lives, suspend your transports and do not send more people to our state.” 

Clearly there is a pattern of sanctuary politicians telling their constituents that if not for Abbott there would not be illegals filling their hotels, schools, and streets. However, illegals are not targeting New York, Chicago, and other blue cities because of Abbott’s policies. Illegals are doing so because of the policies of sanctuary politicians.

These sanctuary politicians in essence bribed illegals to come to them. In fact, sanctuary state governors -- especially the governors of California, New York, and Illinois — were almost in competition over which of their states would be the most popular designation for illegals well before they began cursing Abbott.

Just look at their rhetoric:

• California governor Gavin Newsom said in his 2019 State of the State speech that “The border emergency is a manufactured crisis” and “This is our answer to the White House: No more division, no more xenophobia and no more nativism.”

• One Illinois website commented in 2019 on how the aforementioned Gov. Pritzker and then-Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot were “going out of their way to proclaim the state and city as welcoming to immigrants.”

• New York Governor Hochul said in 2021 “So, our message to the world is send us your people, send us those who need the cloak of comfort that we can demonstrate as New Yorkers with big hearts and open arms, and we'll provide a safe haven.”

Newsom, Pritzer, and Hochul also competed to see which governor could best match their pro-illegal rhetoric with their actions, so collectively they offered a menu of goodies anyone would be hard-pressed to resist.

These governors offered driver’s licenses, free healthcare, free education, free cell phones, free food, in-state tuition, and more. In New York some illegals are being housed in some of the best hotels in the world, paid for by taxpayers, few of which could ever afford to stay in such hotels themselves. California  even provides illegals with free gender reassignment and hormone therapy. These are not actions taken by states that seek to discourage visits from illegals.

It is small wonder then that these sanctuary states are the desired designations of so many illegals long before they reach Texas. They pretend none of these bribes attract illegals the way bird feeders attract blue jays, but the truth is that Abbott is not forcing illegals to go to Chicago, New York, and other sanctuary cities as a means to hurt Black mayors. In fact, these cities are the intended destination of many illegals long before they reach Texas.

As reported in the New York Times:

“ . . . the reality is that the number of migrants offered free passage from Texas over the past year is a fraction of those who regularly make their way from the southern border to cities around the country — to places where there are jobs, family connections and networks of other immigrants from their homelands. And it has been that way for years.”

The NY Times also reported:

“After crossing the southern border, thousands have made their way to New York with the help of officials in Texas. Gov. Greg Abbott has sent thousands in a campaign to provoke outrage and force the federal government to tighten border security. But Mr. Abbott’s buses account for only a small fraction of the people who have arrived . . . “

The number of illegals Texas is sending to sanctuary cities barely bears mention in comparison to the number of illegals invading Texas.  According to CNN, “At the direction of Texas’ Republican Gov. Greg Abbott, the Lone Star state has bused over 90,000 migrants to ‘sanctuary cities’ run by Democrats like Washington, DC, New York City, Chicago, Philadelphia, Denver and Los Angeles since April 2022, according to numbers released by the governor’s office.” This number is roughly 12 percent of the number of illegals El Paso mayor  Oscar Leeser estimates entered his city in 2023 and roughly 4 percent of the number of illegals who came into Texas in fiscal year 2023.

To view this in another way, the number of illegals that Texas sent to sanctuary cities from April 2022 to December 2024 is less than the number of illegals the state took in over a two-week period in December.

Not only are the 90,000 illegals Abbott bused in 2023 a pittance compared to the number of illegals invading Texas, it is also a pittance in comparison to the number of illegals already in these sanctuary states.

According to Statista.com, in 2019 Illinois had 425,000 illegals, New York had 835,000 illegals, and California was home to 2,739,000 illegals. Yet we are to believe that the number of illegals that can fit on a bus is enough to throw these states into crisis.

Oddly, the sanctuary governors and mayors have been loudly quiet on Biden and how Biden’s immigration policies are affecting them.

For example, despite their demonization of Abbott for “creating chaos” by busing illegals across the country, there has been mostly silence on Biden doing essentially the same thing.

A September New York Post op-ed by Todd Bensman, a senior national security fellow at the Center for Immigration Studies, reported that Biden flew more than 200,000 illegals — how much more remains undetermined -- to airports across the country as part of a strategy that encourages illegals to use a CBP One smartphone application.

As per the op-ed:

“But one of the least noticed, mysterious and potentially most controversial of the new rechanneling programs that use the CBP One app allows migrants to take commercial passenger flights from foreign countries straight to their American cities of choice, flying right over the border — and even over Mexico.

For this measure, Cubans, Venezuelans, Nicaraguans, Haitians and Colombians request “advance travel authorizations” through the same CBP One mobile app and take commercial flights (“at their own expense”) directly into US airports, where US Customs officers parole them into the nation, sight unseen, and in numbers publicly unknown.”

Tom and Deneen Borelli also posted an interesting video that raises questions about the scope of the Biden administration’s scheme to disburse illegals after they trailed a bus full of illegals dropping its passengers off in Edison, NJ from Westchester airport:

If the goal was to prevent, or at least curb, the flow of illegals, sanctuary politicians would also be more vocal in demanding that the Biden administration work with Abbott in pushing back against the caravans of migrants invading Texas. If there were fewer illegals entering Texas, then there would be fewer illegals sleeping on the streets of Chicago.

Yet aside from complaining that Uncle Joe has not been generous in doling out to them billions of dollars of taxpayer funds to help sanctuary cities afford to maintain their sanctuary status, Biden’s War on Border Security barely earns a whisper.

Sanctuary politicians seek to divert responsibility away from Biden’s open border policy and their own unpopular policies by creating a Texan Republican Boogeyman.

Yet whatever one thinks about Abbott’s busing policies, his actions are not responsible for the immigration crisis that is costing California, New York, and Illinois a combined $45 billion dollars — and costing the nation over $150 billion -- each year.

And that's before we include the cost of the free sex change operations.

— DK