Chicago’s first black, gay, female mayor who will take office in May says that she would welcome shipments of illegals if the Trump administration were to send them to the Windy City.
Lightfoot’s exclamation was in response to a tweet by President Donald Trump, who said he agreed with the idea of sending busloads of illegals to so-called sanctuary cities.
The mayor-elect, though, didn’t seem to think any shipments of illegals would occur and said she thought Trump was just being “provocative,” according to Fox News. She added that Trump’s rhetoric was “much ado about nothing.”
CNN anchor Anderson Cooper asked Lightfoot if she agreed with outgoing Mayor Rham Emanuel that illegals are welcome in Chicago, to which she replied, “of course.”
“We have people who are routinely coming to this city. We have a whole infrastructure that’s built up to make sure that their rights are protected while the city of Chicago has, under the current administration, provided funding for various groups to help support asylum seekers and other people that are going through the immigration court system. I expect it will continue, if not expand upon, those kinds of resources,” the first-time elected official told CNN.
Lightfoot added that people need to take President Trump for what he is and not jump in outrage every time he makes a provocative tweet.
“What I’m saying is I don’t think we should take the bait every time the president puts out a provocative tweet. What I think we need to do is make sure that we are being very clear and speaking our values,” Lightfoot said.
She continued: “We are a city that is a sanctuary city. We have immigrants from all over the world who call Chicago their home. They’ll continue to do that, and we’re going to continue to make sure that this is truly a welcoming community for those immigrants, and we want them to come to the city of Chicago,” the newly elected mayor concluded.
But the Windy City could ill afford any large number of illegals. The city already has a nearly $250 million budget shortfall, and the city already leads the nation in the number of productive citizens moving out to other states. A flood of illegals who would need public assistance would further burden an already overstretched city.
Follow Warner Todd Huston on Twitter @warnerthuston.
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