DC Council member accuses TX, AZ of turning the capital ‘into a border town’

DC Council Member Brianne Nadeau has laid the blame at the door of both Texas Governor Greg Abbott and Arizona Governor Doug Ducey for turning DC into what she calls a “border town.”

“So, it’s been said, but it’s worth reiterating that the governors of Texas and Arizona have created this crisis and the federal government has not stepped up to assist the District of Columbia,” Nadeau said. “So, we, along with our regional partners will do what we’ve always done. We’ll rise to the occasion.”

“We’ve learned from border towns like El Paso and Brownsville,” she continued. “In many ways the governors, Texas and Arizona have turned us into a border town.”

Nadeau made the statements while standing alongside DC Mayor Muriel Bowser, who has declared the incoming migrants a “public emergency.”

Bowser announced that the district will be creating “a framework that would allow us to have a coordinated response with our partners” in order to “meet all buses” and ensure that “we have a humane, efficient, welcome process that will allow people to move on to their final destination.”

“Regardless of the federal response – which I think has been lacking in some respects – that the District of Columbia would continue to work with partners to advance what we need and ensure our systems in D.C. are not broken by a crisis that is certainly not of our making,” Bowser said.

Greg Abbott’s spokeswoman Renae Eze took aim at Bowser and called her a hypocrite during an interview with The Daily Mail.

“In a city with a population over 700,000, she’s claiming an emergency for just over 7,900 migrants being bused into her sanctuary city. That’s barely 1% of the population of Washington, D.C.,” Eze said. “The true emergency is on our nation’s southern border, not in our nation’s capital, where small Texas border towns are overrun and overwhelmed by hundreds of migrants every single day as the Biden Administration dumps them in their communities.”

“Instead of fearmongering and complaining about a few thousand migrants in her sanctuary city, Mayor Bowser should call on President Biden to do his job and secure the border—something the President continues failing to do,” Eze went on to say. “Governor Abbott’s invitation is still open for Mayor Bowser to visit the border and see the actual crisis firsthand.” 

Abbott stated his intentions to take these actions weeks ahead of Title 42 being removed.

Title 42 comes from a federal law that dates back to 1944 meant to help prevent the spread of communicable disease. Title 42 was utilized by former President Donald Trump to prevent migrants entering as the Covid pandemic was at its peak.

“To help local officials, whose communities are being overwhelmed by hordes of illegal immigrants who are being dropped off by the Biden administration, Texas is providing charter buses to send these illegal immigrants who have been dropped off by the Biden administration, to Washington D.C.,” Abbott said at the time. “We are sending them to the United States Capitol where the Biden administration will be able to more immediately address the needs of the people that they are allowing to come across our border.”