New York’s Migrant Crisis Is Growing. So Are Democrats’ Anxieties.

Author: Editors Desk Source: N.Y Times

September 3, 2023 at 08:40

Republicans appear to be testing whether the state’s growing migrant crisis may prove as potent a political force in 2024 as crime was in 2022.Credit...Jeenah Moon for The New York Times

The influx of asylum seekers has the makings of a potent political force, and Republicans are ready to test it in key 2024 house races.

Republicans successfully made crime the defining issue of the 2022 midterm elections in New York, fanning fears about public safety to rout suburban Democrats and help secure the party its House majority.

Barely a year later, as another critical election season begins to take shape, they appear to be aggressively testing a similar strategy, hoping that the state’s growing migrant crisis will prove as potent a political force in 2024.

The rapid arrival in New York of more than 100,000 asylum seekers is already wreaking havoc on government budgets, testing the city’s safety net and turning Democratic allies against one another. Now, otherwise vulnerable Republicans in a half dozen closely watched districts have begun grabbing onto all of it as a lifeline to portray Democrats as out of touch and unable to govern.

“This is a crisis of their own making,” said Representative Mike Lawler, a Republican fighting to hold a suburban district Mr. Biden won by 10 points.

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