Exasperated New York City Mayor Eric Adams has discovered yet another indefensible aspect of providing blanket “sanctuary” to illegal aliens as the Big Apple buckles under the burden of its disastrous policy. Yet simply stating that he would like to make it easier to deport violent illegals has earned him stern rebuke from his fellow Democrats who run the City Council.
“Speaking at a community meeting on [Feb. 26], Adams said the city's policy that restricts cooperation with US Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials needs to be modified to weed out the ‘small numbers’ of migrants who commit serious crimes,” The Center Square reported.
“So if you commit a violent act we should be able to turn you over to ICE and have you deported,” Adams said at an event in Brooklyn. “Right now, we don't have the authority to do so.”
Adams even dutifully genuflected toward the progressives who dominate local government by stressing he believed he was talking about only a few bad apples in the enormous barrel haphazardly dumped onto the city.
It didn’t work.
New York City Progressives to Mayor: Drop Dead
City Council Speaker Adrienne Adams two days later “called Hizzoner’s suggestion ‘harmful’ and said lawmakers were not planning on making any modifications to the law,” the New York Post reported Feb. 28.
“We are not considering changes to laws. These laws have been in effect for decades,” Speaker Adams crisply declared.
(Photo by Fatih Aktas/Anadolu via Getty Images)
It’s important to note the backdrop to all of this. Mayor Adams made his tepid suggestion following the heavily publicized beating of two NYPD officers at the hands of a gang of migrants. Outrage over the shocking act went national.
“I want to go back to the standards of the previous mayors who I believe subscribe to my belief that people who are suspected of committing serious crimes in the city should be held accountable,” Mayor Adams said Feb. 27.
Speaker Adams, leader of the Democrat-dominated City Council, blamed such unruly behavior on illegal aliens not being immediately allowed to work upon being bused into New York.
“I firmly believe that if we were to have the provision of work, that’s going to take a lot of the idle time away from folks that might frankly have nothing else to do,” she stated, the Post related.
Mayor Adams responded to the rebuke by again attempting to convince NYC progressives that he wasn’t suggesting any serious endeavor be made to stem an illegal alien invasion that he had previously conceded threatens the very existence of the city.
“I want to be clear that the goal is not to deport someone who breaks the law. I’m talking about violent, repeated offenders,” Adams told WINS-AM radio in an interview on March 1, the Post noted.
‘Targeted by Our City’s Racist Policing Policies’
Why does a mayor who touts himself as a “centrist” feel the need to walk so gingerly on the issue of deporting violent criminal illegal aliens? It’s because the entire ruling infrastructure of the city is staunchly opposed to any slackening of the sanctuary policy that has brought New York to the brink of ruin.
“The Legal Aid Society and several public defender organizations across the city criticized the mayor’s comments in a statement on [Feb. 27], saying that the city’s current sanctuary laws are based on the principle of due process,” City & State New York reported.
“These protections aim to ensure that New York City complies with the constitutional requirement of probable cause when working with ICE to detain someone,” the statement asserted. “This allows people, many of whom have been targeted by our city’s racist policing policies, to remain in New York City to fight their cases rather than be turned over to ICE officials, who may detain and deport someone without a criminal trial or conviction.”
Meanwhile, the catastrophe continues to worsen.
“Reports of crimes around [migrant] shelters, including a fatal stabbing at a tent city on Randall's Island last month, have raised public safety concerns,” The Center Square detailed.
“New York City has had an influx of more than 170,000 migrants over the past year, with about 70,000 under the city's care. The city has spent more than $1 billion on housing and other needs for migrants, and Adams has proposed budget cuts to cover those costs.”
It’s a remarkable sight to behold. The Democrat mayor of the largest city in the United States clearly sees that an emotion-driven policy hashed out in simpler times with no thought to the possible consequences down the road has now turned into a social menace so vast that it could be fatal.
Yet, he cannot take even the slightest action against this dire threat without first having to humble himself before the hardline progressives ensconced in positions of power. He must beg and cajole. And what will it get him? Nothing but firm rejection.
Can you hear the disjointed symphony emanating from Manhattan? It is the sound of a thousand bureaucratic Neros fiddling as the Big Apple burns.
