NEW YORK – More than 2,000 immigrant children have arrived in New York since June and are landing at the Westchester County Airport in White Plains. Many in the area say the Biden administration has not answered questions about what will happen to them next.
Two senior US officials confirmed that flights to the New York area have increased as the number of immigrants arriving at the southern border of the country, fewer in many cases, has risen sharply this year. Officials told our sister chain NBC New York that the number of people arriving in the United States is the largest in 15 years.
“It is our legal responsibility to safely care for unaccompanied children until they can quickly unify with a vetted parent or sponsor,” said White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki.
However, there are calls from both sides of the political aisle for the administration to provide more information on the children being transported, who is monitoring them, and what should happen to them next.
Former Westchester County executive and current aspiring New York Governor Rob Astorino said children have been arriving in the area on federally chartered flights and is demanding answers.
“We don’t have answers to basic questions like: Who comes here? Where are they installed or taken? What is their vaccination status?” Astorino asked Tuesday. He has been raising questions about arriving flights since August and says he has received little comment.
“These flights have been landing in Westchester since April. At that time, there were smaller planes. Since August, maybe even July, these are big flights, these are 737s,” Astorino said. “This has a lot to do with our own government not giving people information that affects their lives.”
Astorino said he took a video of people getting off one of the flights to document the influx of so-called unaccompanied minors.
Even Democrats said the lack of information is a problem that needs to be addressed.
“We need information from the administration. Where are they sending these children? So that school districts can be prepared for the influx of children, and then we need to get them money,” said US Representative Tom Suozzi. “I am angry and frustrated.”
Suozzi said 2,500 minors have been transferred to Queens and Long Island alone, and 50 are housed in a facility in Syosset.
Republican Congressman Lee Zeldin took the criticism a step further, saying that “the murkiness and lack of transparency of the Biden administration is completely unacceptable.”
A spokesman for current Westchester County Executive George Latimer said immigrants are vaccinated or screened before arriving.
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