The migrant crisis in New York is so bad that even Democratic Gov. Kathy Hochul is ramping up her attacks on US border policies, demanding “a limit on who can come across’’ and more agents to nab illegals.
Hochul targeted Congress in comments Sunday but still risked the wrath of the Biden administration as it grapples with the crisis wreaking mayhem in the Big Apple and across the country.
“It is too open right now,’’ Hochul flatly told CBS’s “Face the Nation’’ of the country’s southern border with Mexico — where a record-setting 260,000-plus migrants crossed over just last month.
“We want [Congress] to have a limit on who can come across the border,’’ said the governor, who has been criticized in the past for going too easy on the White House over the debacle.
“People coming from all over the world are finding their way through, simply saying they need asylum, and the majority of them seem to be ending up in the streets of New York, and that is a real problem for New York City,” she said.
“It’s in our DNA to welcome immigrants. But there has to be some limits in place,” the governor said.
“Congress has to put more controls at the border,’’ Hochul said. “Talk about eliminating positions for Border Patrol, well, we actually need to double or quadruple those numbers.”
Hochul’s comments come fewer than two weeks after she told CNN, “You have to ensure that we can also have controls at the borders and not welcome even more people to come who think they’re going to come for the job.”
“It really does have to slow down at the border because the volume keeps growing and growing,’’ the governor said at the time.
“So we have to also message properly that we’re at our limit. ‘If you’re going to leave your country, go somewhere else.’ ”
The governor specifically called out congressional Republicans both Sunday and last month on the issue, infuriating some GOPers.
“The only people Hochul has to blame are the ones in her own party,’’ seethed Rep. Nicole Malliotakis (R-SI/Brooklyn) to The Post.
“House Republicans passed our border security act in May with no help from the Democrats, and the Senate has taken zero action to pass our bill or any other immigration measure,” the New York City pol said.
“Also, [Hochul] should stop incentivizing illegal immigration to New York with her offers of free college tuition, healthcare and drivers’ licenses,” Malliotakis said.
House GOP Conference Chair Elise Stefanik, who represents upstate New York communities along the Canadian border, added, “Kathy Hochul sees the same polling that we are looking at, and she and New York Democrats are in free fall.”
Hochul’s comments Sunday come as New York City continues to grapple with the more than 110,000 migrants who have arrived there and entered its shelter system since spring 2022.
The governor has lobbied for state funds to help shelter and feed the wave of migrants, including to pay for a massive tent city erected on Manhattan’s Randall’s Island this summer.
New York City Mayor Eric Adams has said the cost of housing and feeding the influx of migrants will likely hit $12 billion over three years, threatening scores of Big Apple services.
In August, Hochul finally blamed the White House for the migrant mess, saying President Biden needed to step up and provide more help as the state drowns in the migrant flood.
“This crisis originated with the federal government, and it must be resolved through the federal government,’’ she said at the time.
Hochul has already joined Adams in targeting the city’s “right to shelter” law, which guarantees New Yorkers the right to housing, a rule that asylum seekers have been benefiting from.
“The original premise behind the right to shelter was, for starters, for homeless men on the streets, people experiencing AIDS, that was [then] extended to families,” the governor said last month.
“But never was it envisioned being an unlimited universal right, or obligation on the city, to house literally the entire world,’’ she said.
Adams has been trying to tweak the rule to try to free up more housing for those most in need.