Bloomberg blasts Biden’s handling of migrant crisis as billionaire donor warns Dems will pay at the polls
Powerful Democratic billionaire donor Michael Bloomberg on Monday ratcheted up the pressure on President Biden over the migrant crisis — skewering him for turning a blind eye to the US’s broken border laws.
Bloomberg — while heaping praise on New York City Mayor Eric Adams for doing an “admirable job” trying to cope with the lack of federal support over the debacle — raged in a column that the White House will be responsible for sweeping Democratic losses up and down the ticket in 2024 if the Biden administration doesn’t wake up.
“Think about it: We have a system that essentially allows an unlimited number of people to cross our borders, forbids them from working, offers them free housing, and grants them seven years of residency before ruling on whether they can legally stay,” the news tech titan-turned philanthropist and former Big Apple mayor, 81, wrote in the New York Times.
“It would be hard to devise a more backward and self-defeating system,” Bloomberg said.
The blistering column is only adding to the mounting pressure on the White House — especially from within Biden’s own party and among deep-pocketed donors — to adequately address the crisis.
Last month, more than 100 Big Apple execs sent a letter to Biden and Congress saying US immigration and border policies “are clearly a federal responsibility” and that the powerhouse business people are “deeply concerned” about where the country is headed on the issue.
Bloomberg wrote that both sides of the political aisle are responsible for finding a solution — but the Dems could suffer the worst at the polls if one is not quickly found.
“It’s imperative that Congress and the president work together to secure the resources and adopt the policy changes necessary to fix the asylum process,” Bloomberg said.
“Tackling the crisis in ways that stay true to our history and values is the best way to help asylum seekers, support cities and prevent xenophobes from gaining political power.”
Bloomberg — who flanked Adams at the 9/11 memorial service in Lower Manhattan on Monday — came to the defense of Hizzoner, who has been battling the White House for more federal aid to cope with the flood of migrants into the Big Apple in recent months.
Adams last week warned the issue will “destroy” New York City without more help from the Biden administration, prompting backlash that the remarks were anti-migrant.
“Critics who have latched onto Mayor Adams’s recent comments that the crisis will ‘destroy’ the city seem more concerned with his words — spoken in understandable frustration with Washington — than with the problem itself,” Bloomberg wrote, lauding the mayor’s “admirable job” in handling the more than 100,000 migrants who have come through the city since the start of the crisis in spring 2022.
But it’s not just NYC where the crisis is increasing, Bloomberg said.
“Chicago, Philadelphia, Washington, Denver and other cities are also experiencing an influx of asylum seekers who have no housing and no means of legally earning money,” he wrote. “Meanwhile, the federal government is failing to provide the resources necessary to hear asylum cases in anything approaching an expeditious fashion.
“It can take six or seven years for an applicant’s case to be resolved,” the former mayor said.
Much of what Bloomberg blasted Biden and Congress over echoed the alarms raised by New York City’s business community last month.
“Immigration policies and control of our country’s border are clearly a federal responsibility; state and local governments have no standing in this matter,” read a letter penned by the Partnership for New York City.
“The New York business community is deeply concerned about the humanitarian crisis that has resulted from the continued flow of asylum-seekers into our country,’’ said the missive, signed by such business powerhouses as JPMorgan boss Jamie Dimon and Macy’s chairman Jeff Gennette.
But days later, after a closed-door meeting between White House officials and Gov. Kathy Hochul — who along with Adams has repeatedly banged the drum on fast-tracked work visas — the Biden White House only tried to enlist the private sector to pitch-in in the crisis for free.
Adams and Hochul have both called on the federal government to take ownership of the crisis, but their pleas have been largely ignored.
