Gov. Hochul says upstate N.Y. officials should welcome migrants

Gov. Hochul suggested Wednesday that upstate officials who have attempted to block New York City from sending migrant buses to their communities should remember “where their parents and grandparents came from.”

Hochul, who has defended the city’s handling of thousands of migrants in its care, said some upstate officials had valid concerns about communication of the city’s busing program. But she added that she was disappointed “to know that there are places in our state where they’re not as welcoming.”

“I do believe in what this state stands for,” Hochul, a Democrat, said at a news conference in downtown Brooklyn. “The reason we are the great state we are is because of the people who came through the doors or came to our shores for generations.”

She did not single out any county or municipality in her ancestry appeal.

New York City has resorted in recent weeks to busing small groups of migrants upstate as its shelter system buckles. More than 70,000 migrants have arrived in the city since last spring, according to a city tally, as political upheaval in Venezuela and Nicaragua spills refugees into the U.S.

Some upstate communities, including Albany and Liberty, have welcomed batches of migrants without obvious resistance. But others have taken legal steps to stop the buses.

Colonie, a town neighboring Albany that received about 25 migrants over the weekend, sued New York City in State Supreme Court and secured a temporary order preventing more transfers.

The Hudson Valley counties of Rockland and Orange also leveled lawsuits against the city this month and were granted temporary restraining orders.

Rockland County Executive Ed Day, a Republican, said this month that “child rapists” and “criminals” are among the asylum seekers. He threatened to grab Mayor Adams, a Democrat, “by the throat.”

A spokeswoman for Day, Beth Cefalu, said in a Wednesday statement that Hochul should work with federal officials to “put an end to incentivized illegal immigration.”

She suggested the city has far more housing space to place migrants than Rockland does, and said 38 of 57 New York counties outside the five boroughs have taken emergency actions in response to the busing program, by her count.

Armoni Inn and Suites, a Rockland County hotel that had been expected to house asylum seekers and was named in the county’s lawsuit, said in a filing last week that the county has “racist motivations.”

Hochul did not go so far. But she said she hoped the dialogue around the asylum seekers would change.

“There’s a lot of early hysteria around this,” she said. “I just want to help dial down the anxiety around this, and the hyperbole. And just remind people that New York is a special place.”