(The Center Square) – Since October, nearly 1,500 migrants who crossed the U.S. border into Texas have arrived in Chicago, and now the city is asking state lawmakers for more funding.
According to the letter obtained by the Chicago Tribune, Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot sent a letter to Chicago area lawmakers to get the Illinois General Assembly to allocate $53.5 million to help care for the migrants.
In the letter, Lightfoot requested funding for “emergency services” and asked for the funding to be approved “before the 102 General Assembly adjourns,” which would be on Jan. 10.
State Rep. Adam Niemerg, R-Tuetopolis, was in Springfield for a lame-duck session and told The Center Square that Lightfoot and the city need to use its own funding.
“I would ask Mayor Lightfoot why she has not allocated certain monies from her own budget for the city of Chicago, since she is a sanctuary city, to forecast this migrant surge or illegal immigrant surge,” Niemerg said.
Maggie Rivera of the Illinois Migrant Council told The Center Square in October what kind of resources are needed now that the migrants have arrived.
“They need food, and another thing is clothes,” Rivera said. “Most of these people have arrived on a bus after a long trip and only have one or two changes.”
Without funding and help from state government, Lightfoot suggested the city will not have enough money to support any of the migrants past Feb. 1. Niemerg said Lightfoot needs to solve her own problems.
“I am very open to legal immigration but the way we see it now is completely unacceptable,” Niemerg said. “I would say to the mayor, find your own money for your problems and do not come to the state.”
Lightfoot said the state had seen an uptick in migrants from Haiti, Cuba, and Nicaragua.
