Democrat-run “sanctuary” state Massachusetts will soon close its doors to immigrants who illegally crossed the border and were released into the United States only to travel to the New England state in need of housing, work, and food.
Gov. Maura Healey (D-MA) issued a blunt warning to families across the state in need of shelter Monday morning that it would put its foot down in terms of assisting people find overnight housing despite its shelter requirement law.
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“Today, we can share that our shelter system is on the verge of reaching capacity,” Healey said. “Especially with winter approaching, we need everyone to understand that we are entering a new phase of this challenge. We can no longer guarantee shelter placement for families.”
Massachusetts is weeks away from surpassing its 7,500-family housing capacity. At present, the state has 6,945 families, or 23,000 people, in its family shelter system. Families are being held in hotels, motels, college dormitories, and other impromptu shelters.
A 1983 state law requires the state to provide shelter for all eligible families, but Healey said the state will roll out a wait list once it hits 7,500 families. The move will put the Massachusetts government in violation of its own law.
Roughly half of the families are Massachusetts residents and the other half arrived from the southern border.
At Healey’s request, a team from the federal Department of Homeland Security visited the state late last week to see what the state faced with immigrants arriving daily from the border.
“DHS is coordinating with the City of Boston and the State of Massachusetts to identify ways we can continue to maximize our support for communities that are addressing the needs of migrants while enforcing tough consequences against those without a legal basis to remain in the country,” a DHS spokesperson wrote in an email on Oct. 9, ahead of the trip.
Healey and Rep. Jake Auchincloss (D-MA) called on President Joe Biden to help the state in mid-September. Massachusetts became the latest in August to declare a state of emergency over its inability to handle thousands of illegal immigrants who have arrived after being released from federal custody at the U.S.-Mexico border.
“We need the Biden administration to compensate for the tremendous cost of sheltering the migrants,” Auchincloss said last month.
The Biden administration touted $2.8 million in aid that the government has provided to Boston since October 2022.
Massachusetts House Speaker Ron Mariano, a Democrat, told WCVB on Sunday that the $250 million Healey had requested would not get the state through the end of the month, much less past then.
“It’s not going to solve the problem. It may not even get us to the end of the month,” Mariano said before he knocked Congress.
“Calvary isn’t on the other side of the hill,” Mariano said. “There’s a rudderless ship that controls the spigot for the help that we need.”
Healey spoke out in August and said the problem was not one for local or state governments to carry but for the federal government.
Massachusetts’s 7 million residents join other localities, including New York City, Chicago, and Washington, that have grappled to respond to the number of immigrants released into their communities from the border under Biden. All are sanctuary zones that have refused to cooperate with the federal government’s immigration policies.
In 2017, the state’s top court ruled that court officers do not have the authority to arrest or hold an illegal immigrant solely because he or she was named in a federal immigration request, effectively making the state a “sanctuary” zone that would not turn over people with criminal histories, but release them into the community.
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Since then, Massachusetts has rolled out initiatives to help immigrants who are awaiting asylum and deportation proceedings years down the road live normal lives while in the country. Just last month, the state began allowing any noncitizen residing in the state to obtain a noncommercial driver’s license.
Illegal immigrants are also eligible for state assistance programs that cover the cost of food, as well as receive select healthcare coverage through the state’s MassHealth Limited plan and financial assistance to pay rent through the Residential Assistance for Families in Transition, Emergency Rental and Mortgage Assistance Program, and Emergency Rental Assistance Program, according to the state’s website.
