HOW IT STARTED: Mayor Rahm Emanuel: ‘Chicago Always Will Be A Sanctuary City.’
Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel added his voice to the chorus of big-city mayors who say theirs will remain “sanctuary cities” in response to President-elect Donald Trump’s hard-line positions on illegal immigration.
Surrounded by immigration activists, business leaders and state and federal lawmakers, Emanuel sought to reduce the fear of immigrants living in this country without authorization.
“To all those who are, after Tuesday’s election, very nervous and filled with anxiety … you are safe in Chicago, you are secure in Chicago and you are supported in Chicago,” said Emanuel at a news conference called to publicize the expansion of mental health services for people anxious over the election results.
“Chicago has in the past been a sanctuary city. … It always will be a sanctuary city,” the mayor said.
—NPR, November 14th, 2016.
How it’s going: Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson Blames City’s Illegal Immigrant Crisis on ‘Right Wing Extremism’ (Video).
JOHNSON: It has to be better coordination. What we have seen is a raggedy form instituted by right-wing extremism. Everyone knows that the right-wing extremism in this country has targetted Democratically-ran cities and quite frankly, they’ve been very intentional about going after Democratically-ran cities that are led by people of color.
Their whole motivation is to create disruption and chaos because that’s what this particular party has been about. This is the same political party that did not want to accept that President Obama was actually an American. It’s the same Republican right-wing extremism that stormed the Capitol. It’s the same right-wing extremism that refuses to accept the results of the Civil War. It’s raggedy. It’s disrespectful it’s mean-spirited. It’s an unclean spirit, quite frankly.
So I got you. I got you. I just want to make sure that people understand what we’re facing. That’s why it’s so important that the faith community is leaning in at this moment. And so what what I’ve said, there has to be better coordination.
—Gateway Pundit, yesterday.
Earlier: Sanctuary Cities Seethe as Illegal Immigrants Actually Arrive.
The surest sign that public policies are simply virtue signals is when the messages don’t cost anything. The easiest way to tell when that signal starts to fail is to watch politicians flounder as the costs start to rise and voters demand relief.
It was free—and meaningless—for progressive churches to post banners calling themselves “nuclear free zones” during the Reagan era. Their dwindling congregations loved it. It was free, after George Floyd‘s murder, to post woke catechism signs on your front lawn, proclaiming “In this house, we believe: Black Lives Matter, women’s rights are human rights, no human is illegal” and so on. Maybe the neighbors gave you high-fives. And for years it has been free for deep-blue cities to proclaim themselves “sanctuaries” for illegal immigrants. That’s changing now that voters want some sanctuary for themselves.
Changes like this happen when voters realize the old virtue signals actually entail serious costs—and that they will have to pay them. That is exactly what’s happening in New York City and Washington D.C. now that Texas governor Greg Abbott is sending those cities a few busloads of illegal immigrants from his state.
These progressive bastions were silent when the Biden administration flew planeloads of illegal immigrants to suburban airports in the middle of the night. TV coverage was prohibited, and the arrivals were secretly dispersed. Abbott’s buses, by contrast, arrive downtown greeted by local TV crews. Now you can hear the politicians screech.
The ghost of Saul Alinsky smiles: “Make opponents live up to their own book of rules. ‘You can kill them with this, for they can no more obey their own rules than the Christian church can live up to Christianity.’”