El Paso Mayor Oscar Leeser touts the opening of a new migrant shelter in preparation for a surge of asylum seekers in the Texas border city amid the ongoing migrant crisis.
The opening of the shelter comes with a massive migrant caravan heading through Mexico going to the United States. The shelter was previously a vacant middle school repurposed and opened on Friday. City officials also noted that the new shelter will be able to house hundreds of individuals.
El Paso's New Migrant Shelter
Leeser said that while the migrant crisis in the United States continues to unfold, he urged the public to remember that "our humanity is tested in how we care for the vulnerable." West Texas has become a more popular border crossing location for migrants.
The state's sixth-largest city also serves as a decompression center when migrants who enter the country in other parts of the border overwhelm those areas. The caravan of migrants that is currently traveling to the U.S. comes as thousands of asylum seekers cross into the U.S. every day, as per the Daily Mail.
The U.S. Border Patrol is currently transferring migrants who illegally cross into the country in Lukeville, Arizona, and Eagle Pass, Texas, to El Paso. After the asylum seekers are in West Texas, they undergo vetting and screening called "processing."
Migrants seeking asylum in the United States often make their case during this time. Those who pass the security clearance are released into the country to await a court date, which is usually scheduled years in the future.
After immigration officials release asylum seekers, migrants who have the means to travel will catch buses or planes out of town. However, those who do not have money to leave El Paso will end up in the city's migrant shelters operated by charities that are currently at capacity.
The situation comes as Texas Gov. Greg Abbott recently started flying migrants out of the state and into other states, the first of which is Chicago. The latter is now struggling due to the number of asylum seekers that are being sent to the region without prior warning, according to NPR.
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Ongoing Migrant Crisis
Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson said the situation is dire as people have been forced to sleep on floors and outside. He added that the local police districts have been overwhelmed since the very start of the arrival of the migrants in the state.
The migrant crisis has already cost Chicago hundreds of millions of dollars and the city has since worked to clear the police stations. However, there are now reports of illnesses and even the death of a child at a migrant shelter.
Texas' decision to send migrants to Chicago comes after Abbott has already authorized busing operations that have brought more than 80,000 asylum seekers to Democratic-led cities since last year.
But now, bus operators could face stricter penalties in Chicago for not unloading newly arriving migrants at a designated location or failing to fill our proper paperwork, said the Associated Press.
