Texas has spent nearly $150M bussing migrants to 'sanctuary' cities: report

Texas has spent nearly $150 million of taxpayer funds bussing illegal immigrants to sanctuary cities since Gov. Gregg Abbott launched the controversial initiative in April 2022, according to a new report. 

Abbott, a Republican, started the program to relieve Texas of the influx of migrants who illegally cross the southern border and are then released into the state. It was also launched to protest the Biden administration’s rollback of some pandemic-era border restrictions and to let "sanctuary" cities bear the brunt of their open border policies. 

Last month, Abbott announced that the state has now sent over 100,000 migrants to sanctuary cities across the United States to relieve what he said are overwhelmed border states. Arizona also began bussing migrants in 2022, while Florida has also done so, as well as flying migrants to liberal strongholds like Martha's Vineyard in Massachusetts.

Migrants board a city bus to a shelter intake center after traveling on a bus from Del Rio, Texas, to the Port Authority Bus Terminal in New York City on May 13, 2023. (Victor J. Blue)

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The bussing of migrants is part of Texas’ Operation Lone Star, a joint operation between the Texas Department of Public Safety and the Texas Military Department to secure the border. Abbott began bussing migrants to Washington, D.C., and then expanded to cities including New York City, Denver, Philadelphia and Chicago. Additionally, the state has sent flights to some cities.

The practice has proven to be enormously controversial with those liberal cities and with the Biden administration, who have accused Texas of deliberately causing disruption with a political stunt. 

However, the initiative has come with a hefty price tag with a report from NPR’s The Texas Newsroom – citing records obtained under the Texas Public Information Act – calculating the cost at more than $148 million as of Jan. 24.

Ray Perryman, the president of The Perryman Group, a Texas-based economic research company, said that the $148 million amounts to about half of one percent of Texas' $321 billion two-year state budget. 

"It certainly is a great deal of money to be spent," Perryman told The Texas Newsroom.

"These dollars ... are not a huge percentage of the overall budget so it's certainly something that could be done," Perryman said. "I think the question is, 'Should it be done?'"

Texas has spent nearly $150 million of taxpayer funds bussing illegal immigrants to sanctuary cities since Gov. Gregg Abbott launched the controversial initiative in April 2022. (Brandon Bell/Getty Images, left, John Moore/Getty Images, right)

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While announcing last month that Texas had transported over 100,000 migrants to sanctuary cities, Abbott said he had no intention of stopping the initiative. 

"Until Biden reverses course on his open border policies, Texas will continue transporting migrants to these cities," Abbott said on X. "We will not back down on our efforts to secure the border."

Abbott has been reinforcing efforts to stop migrants from crossing into Texas by erecting razor wire and denying federal agents access to Shelby Park. The actions have, in part, led to a sharp decline in border crossings throughout January.

Overall, arrests by Border Patrol along the southern border dropped 50% in January compared to December. 

Sanctuary cities, meanwhile, have complained about the bussing of migrants, with New York City Mayor Eric Adams saying the crisis will "destroy" the Big Apple. Adams has said the state has taken in 170,000 migrants since the spring of 2022 and the cost of feeding and housing them will be at least $10 billion.

A Chinese migrant speaks to a border patrol officer before being processed after crossing the Rio Grande into the U.S. (Brandon Bell)

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Both New York City and Chicago have put restrictions on charter buses coming to their cities and Adams has filed a $700 million lawsuit against bus and transportation companies involved in migrant transport.

Meanwhile, Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker last month pleaded with Abbott to stop sending migrants to Chicago due to incoming winter storms. Abbott has sent over 30,000 migrants to Chicago since the middle of 2022.

The numbers seen by those cities are a fraction of the millions of migrants that have hit the southern border. There were 2.4 million migrant encounters in FY23 alone and over 302,000 in December.

Fox News’ Adam Shaw contributed to this report.