The end of Title 42 Restrictions will likely create a surge of migrants at the US-Mexico border, overwhelming Border Patrol and setting the stage for a massive fiasco. This could have easily been avoided by implementing an Ellis Island - style system of immigration: migrants and asylum seekers would undergo criminal and medical background checks to ensure they are not dangerous and then sent on their way. This is very similar to how immigrants were processed at Ellis Island. Instead, the legal immigration process is an unnavigable labyrinth of paperwork and processes that can take decades to complete, and that assumes the government agent handling a case doesn’t lose that paperwork, which forces the aspiring immigrant to start over. People who are risking their lives to reach the United States are facing starvation, poverty, corruption, and violent drug cartels and gangs - they don’t have time to immigrate legally, they are forced to break the law because they have no other choice! It’s either enter illegally or die. Which would you pick?

Immigration is a human right, and anyone law-abiding person should be able to come here, start a new life, and contribute to society. An Ellis-Island style immigration policy would make legal immigration so easy that illegal immigration would disappear. There would be no need to enter illegally unless the intent was criminal activity, which would be more easily stopped. Why then, hasn’t this policy been adopted? That’s easy: Democrats and Republicans will never solve the border crisis because then they wouldn’t be able to campaign on it. They are putting their own political agenda above human rights.

That said, New York City has no right to foist busloads of migrants on communities here in the Hudson Valley. The City declared itself a sanctuary city, not Newburgh, and therefore it has the responsibility to care for any migrants sent their way; City officials have no right to shirk this responsibility and make other municipalities shoulder the burden they took on. It is not Newburgh’s fault New York City’s mayor is too inept to handle incoming migrants. By declaring itself a sanctuary city, NYC invited migrants to live there, which is fine, but it is NYC’s responsibility to help these migrants get on their feet. If those migrants wish to move elsewhere, then they must do so with their own money.

Supervisor Piaquadio should charter a bus and send the migrants back to the City, along with two items: a bill for the bus, and a message that Newburgh will not be forced to handle New York City’s responsibilities or suffer the consequences of Mayor Adams’ incompetence.