OPINION: This article may contain commentary which reflects the author's opinion.
It is one thing to advocate for amnesty for illegal aliens and make your city a “sanctuary city” when you are not inundated with migrants the way Southern border states are.
But since Texas and other states began bussing migrants to Washington DC, and other Northern sanctuary cities, the welcoming message from their mayors has changed.
That is the case in DC where its Mayor Muriel Bowser has asked for, and been denied again, for the National Guard to be deployed to assist the city, Fox News reported.
For the second time, the Pentagon denied a request on Monday by Washington, D.C., Mayor Muriel Bowser to activate the National Guard to assist with thousands of migrants who have been arriving in the nation’s capital in recent months.
Bowser first asked for National Guard help last month, but it was rejected by the Pentagon on Aug. 4. She then sent another letter on Aug. 11, requesting that 150 National Guard troops be deployed to “help prevent a prolonged humanitarian crisis in our nation’s capital resulting from the daily arrival of migrants.”
Defense Department executive secretary Kelly Bulliner Holly wrote in a letter to Bowser on Monday that the D.C. National Guard is not trained to assist migrants and activation would lead to “diminished readiness” for the troops
“The DCNG has no specific experience in or training for this kind of mission or unique skills for providing facility management, feeding, sanitation or ground support,” the secretary said to the DC mayor in a letter obtained by Fox News.
“Approval of this request would also result in a substantial readiness impact to the DCNG,” she said. “Devoting the personnel or the facility for such an extended mission would force the cancellation or disruption of military training.”
Texas Gov. Greg Abbott sent around 7,000 migrants to DC and around 900 to New York City.
“Before we began busing migrants to New York, it was just Texas and Arizona that bore the brunt of all the chaos and problems that come with it,” the Texas governor said. “Now, the rest of America can understand exactly what is going on.”
The DC mayor responded on Twitter, and she definitely does not expect DC to be the migrants’ final destination.
“We are going to move forward with our planning to ensure that when people are coming through DC on their way to their final destination we have a humane setting for them,” she said.
“We know that these unannounced buses are a politically motivated stunt, one that could very quickly lead to a crisis within our own systems. We struggle with a broken immigration system in our country, and we know that cities alone cannot fix it.
“We will continue working with federal partners and local NGOs on the best way to set up systems that allow us to manage an ongoing humanitarian crisis,” the mayor said.
“As we do that, we remain focused on working with District agencies and local providers to ensure our local systems can continue to function and that we can continue to meet the very real and significant needs of DC residents.
“And, of course, we will continue fighting for DC statehood so that, in the future, when the Mayor of DC says that we need the support of the DC National Guard, she has the ability to deploy the Guard,” she said.
We are going to move forward with our planning to ensure that when people are coming through DC on their way to their final destination that we have a humane setting for them.
— Mayor Muriel Bowser (@MayorBowser) August 22, 2022
This month, Texas Republican Gov. Greg Abbott had the greatest response to Washington D.C., Democrat Mayor Muriel Bowser after she complained about her city being inundated with illegal aliens.
“With pledges from Texas and Arizona to continue these abhorrent operations indefinitely, the situation is dire, and we consider this a humanitarian crisis — one that could overwhelm our social support network without immediate and sustained federal intervention,” the mayor complained as she asked for help from the National Guard.
“We’ve had a number of discussions,” the mayor said. “We’ve facilitated FEMA’s involvement with a million dollar grant that has now been increased to work with a lead nonprofit agency. We’ve facilitated using those grant funds to set up a respite center in a neighboring jurisdiction and I’ve also asked the Secretary of the Army to deploy the D.C. National Guard to help lead that effort.”
The Republican governor responded to her complaints on Twitter.
D.C. is experiencing a fraction of the disastrous impact the border crisis has caused Texas.
Mayor Bowser should stop attacking Texas for securing the border & demand Joe Biden do his job. https://t.co/ThEmjxQMK3
— Greg Abbott (@GregAbbott_TX) July 28, 2022
“D.C. is experiencing a fraction of the disastrous impact the border crisis has caused Texas. Mayor Bowser should stop attacking Texas for securing the border & demand Joe Biden do his job,” he said.
