What to Know
- Less than 24 hours after hundreds of asylum seekers were seen sleeping on a sidewalk outside New York City's arrival intake center in midtown, all the migrants were suddenly gone Thursday afternoon
- In a statement Thursday evening, the administration said that they have received more than 95,000 asylum seekers since Spring 2022
- With an average of 300 to 500 people arriving by day, the city is taking new drastic steps, like giving unaccompanied migrants already under the city’s care a 60-day notice to find another roof over their heads
Less than 24 hours after hundreds of asylum seekers were seen sleeping on a sidewalk outside New York City's arrival intake center in midtown, all the migrants were suddenly gone Thursday afternoon.
The stunning development left the sidewalk empty in front of the Roosevelt Hotel on East 45th Street and Madison Avenue — a sight that had not been seen in some time, as some had been staying there for days.
Witnesses and sources with City Hall said that the asylum seekers were awakened in the morning, processed and moved somewhere with a cot. Police were seen dismantling the barricades that had corralled the migrants into an outdoor pen for the world to see, drawing attention to the city's plight.
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The images also brought criticism to Mayor Eric Adams, who warned earlier in the week "this is not going to get any better, it's only going to go downhill from here."
A source within the Adams administration said they do not expect another line to form, at least not soon, because for now they have managed to find enough space to avoid more migrants sleeping on the street. City Hall called it insulting to suggest that allowing a several-day-long refugee line in the street was a political stunt.
The night prior, the Legal Aid Society said its lawyers went to court to petition a judge, asking for an emergency hearing to receive intervention on behalf of their clients' health and safety.
“Thankfully, soon after we wrote to the court, the City found alternate spaces for the people who were waiting on the street outside the Roosevelt Hotel and those new arrivals were transferred to interim sites," a joint statement from Legal Aid and Coalition for the Homeless said Thursday afternoon.
City officials drew a line in the sand earlier in the week when they notably stopped guaranteeing that they would continue building more and more shelters for migrants as quickly as they come.
In a statement Thursday evening, the administration said that they have received more than 95,000 asylum seekers since Spring 2022.
"Children and families continue to be prioritized and are found a bed every night, but, as we have said repeatedly, our system has reached a breaking point. We have simply run out of space for adult migrants, yet are still receiving hundreds of new migrants daily," a statement from City Hall read. "We are doing our best to offer placements whenever we have space available, have two additional humanitarian relief centers scheduled to come online in the coming weeks to serve this population."
A City Hall source said that some faith-based organizations were able to take a number of migrants Wednesday night, adding that the line outside the Roosevelt Hotel "likely" goes up and down. Mayor Adams' chief of staff said that a church in Long Island City took in about 130 single adult men who were in line.
Officials at City Hall on Wednesday said migrants could soon be living up in other iconic areas of the city, including places like Central Park.
"Everything is on the table," NYC Deputy Mayor Anne Williams-Isom said Wednesday. "As of July 30, we have 107,900 people in our care, including 56,600 asylum seekers. Over 95,600 people have come through our system since last spring."
According to the city's tracking, more than 2,300 migrants entered its system in just one week between July 24 and July 30.
