Assembly Member Jenifer Rajkumar speaks at a rally for Federal support to help serve asylum seekers at City Hall. The city is struggling financially to support the influx of illegal immigrants seeking asylum.
Photo by Lev Radin/Pacific Press/LightRocket via Getty Images
Assemblywoman Jenifer Rajkumar collected the signatures of 54 Queens legislators in her letter sent to President Joe Biden, urging him to recognize the city’s need for help in handling the increase of migrants, on Wednesday, July 26.
In the letter drafted by Rajkumar, legislators ask Biden to declare a state of emergency to receive federal aid for better shelter, food relief, healthcare, legal aid, and transportation options. The letter also asks the White House to implement a strategy to expedite work authorization for asylum seekers and create a fair distribution system at the country’s borders.
“New Yorkers take pride in welcoming immigrants. Our country was founded by immigrants. Immigrants have boosted our economy and standing in the world,” read the letter. “Immigrants contribute $2 trillion to our GDP each year. They are 20% of our essential workers. They drive our Nation’s innovation, being responsible for more than 75% of the patents filed by top universities.”
The congregate of elected officials also asked the president for more federal funding. Rajkumar mentioned in the letter that the city continues to support over 4,000 asylum seekers arriving every week and adopted the lump sum of feeding and housing responsibility of over 80,000 last year.
“As New Yorkers who love our city, we stand ready to help and to support our president in taking leadership over one of the greatest crises New York City has ever faced. We hope that you consider our requests. We believe that with your leadership, we can turn this crisis into opportunity and that this can become one of history’s greatest success stories,” Rajkumar wrote.
As the former director of Immigration…
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