Pritzker: Biden Needs to Tell Migrants Coming to Illinois ‘Can Be Dangerous’

On Wednesday’s broadcast of MSNBC’s “Morning Joe,” Biden-Harris National Advisory Board member Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker (D) stated that the migrants coming to Illinois “are here legally, these asylum seekers, they’re here to get a hearing and to have a decision made about whether or not they can stay in the United States.” But the Biden administration must “make it clear to the people who are at the border that getting on a bus to Chicago or New York in mid-October, heading into winter, where it’s going to be 20 degrees or 10 degrees, and where we just do not have enough shelter for everybody, that can be dangerous.”

Pritzker stated, “[T]his problem originates at the border. There needs to be border security. There also needs to be comprehensive immigration reform, and so, in addition to talking about those things directly with the White House for nine months, I felt that there wasn’t enough being done to try to find other places in the country — and remember, these folks are here legally, these asylum seekers, they’re here to get a hearing and to have a decision made about whether or not they can stay in the United States. In that time period, they shouldn’t all be sent to New York and Chicago. We really do need the rest of the country to step up, and only the federal government can really do that. And so, we’ve asked them to take charge at the border, to make sure they’re not just dropping people off at Catholic Charities, where they’re being influenced to send people to Chicago, to New York, and instead, they need to take charge and make it clear to the people who are at the border that getting on a bus to Chicago or New York in mid-October, heading into winter, where it’s going to be 20 degrees or 10 degrees, and where we just do not have enough shelter for everybody, that can be dangerous. And so, we want to make sure that we’re getting help from the rest of the country.”

Follow Ian Hanchett on Twitter @IanHanchett