Illegal immigrants from Central and South America load into vans near the residence of Vice President Kamala Harris after being dropped off in Washington, on Sept. 15, 2022. (Kevin Dietsch/Getty Images)
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Another bus carrying illegal immigrants arrived outside Vice President Kamala Harris’s home in Washington, early on Sept. 17, according to video footage. Additionally, another wave of buses also arrived in New York City.
The District of Columbia busload reportedly carried men, women, and children, including newborns, mostly hailing from Venezuela and Nicaragua, an NBC reporter who filmed the group of immigrants getting off the bus said on Twitter.
Saturday’s early morning incident now marks the third bus that has been sent to Harris’s District of Columbia home this week.
According to Fox News, which first reported the Sept. 17 arrival, around 50 illegal immigrants got off the bus, and aid workers quickly collected the people and took them to a local shelter.
Meanwhile, media footage and photos from the network also show that three more buses arrived at New York City’s Port Authority Bus Terminal early on Saturday. According to the pictures, it wasn’t immediately clear how many people were on the buses.
In a statement last week, Texas Gov. Greg Abbott said the state has currently bused over 7,900 illegal immigrants to the U.S. capital since April, and over 2,200 to New York City since early August. Several hundred immigrants have also been dropped off in Chicago as part of a mission to provide “much-needed relief to our overwhelmed border communities.”
Earlier this week, Abbott announced that two buses carrying “more than 100 migrants” who had been picked up by authorities in Eagle Pass, Texas, arrived at the U.S. Naval Observatory—which is the vice president’s residence.
Abbott said at the time that the buses were sent as retaliation to Harris’s recent comment, in which the vice president—who was tapped last year by President Joe Biden to oversee U.S. border security—claimed that America’s border with Mexico is “secure.”
The Republican governor hasn’t confirmed yet if the buses on Sept. 17 were also sent by him, though on Thursday, he said that the state “will continue sending migrants to sanctuary cities like Washington, D.C. until President Biden and Border Czar Harris step up and do their jobs to secure the border.”
This week, the White House sharply criticized Abbott and Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis for transporting illegal immigrants to Harris’s residence and Martha’s Vineyard.
Others, including a former speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives, have said the transports have exposed hypocrisy on behalf of Democrats, who support sanctuary city policies.
“How can Vice President Kamala Harris complain if two busloads of illegal migrants are delivered to her home. After all, she told the whole country … ‘the border is secure’! Maybe she was wrong!” Newt Gingrich, who served as the 50th speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives, wrote on Twitter.
For months, Abbott’s administration has sent dozens of buses filled with people who illegally crossed the U.S.–Mexico border to New York, Chicago, and Washington. Arguing that Texas border towns are inundated and overwhelmed by a significant increase in illegal immigration, the governor said that policymakers in those Democrat-run cities and states should face the realities of the immigration rules they support.
The Republican governor also said those areas are self-proclaimed “sanctuary cities,” meaning they won’t comply with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials, and they are a more suitable location for illegal aliens than Texas.
