Bus carrying immigrants from Texas to arrive in Philly on Wednesday

»Update: Immigrants sent to Philly by Texas governor arrive at 30th Street Station

Philadelphia officials and immigrant-assistance groups are preparing to welcome a bus of migrants to the city early Wednesday morning, people originally from Central and South America who have been sent here from Texas by Gov. Greg Abbott.

About 38 people, including seven children, are expected to arrive at 30th Street Station at about 6 a.m., according to immigration advocates in Philadelphia.

“As a proud and welcoming city, Philadelphia will greet our newly arrived neighbors with dignity and respect,” Mayor Jim Kenney said in a statement Tuesday afternoon. “It’s disgusting that Gov. Abbott’s administration continues to implement their purposefully cruel policy using immigrant families as political pawns.”

The mayor shared a “How you can help” briefing, which can be read here.

“We have confirmation [the bus] is on it’s way,” said Peter Pedemonti, codirector of New Sanctuary Movement in Philadelphia. “These are mothers and fathers and brothers and sisters. We welcome them with support, solidarity and love.”

For days, Philadelphia officials have been preparing to welcome a bus, uncertain if it was coming, saying they’ll be ready with food, water, emergency health screenings, and shelter.

Abbott confirmed on Tuesday that along with Chicago, New York, and Washington, “sanctuary city Philadelphia will now be a drop-off location for the state of Texas busing strategy.”

Texas has been sending migrants to Northern cities in what it says is an effort to relieve pressure at the border, and others call a political stunt that harms and confuses innocent people.

This bus is coming from Del Rio, Texas, on the border west of San Antonio.

Philadelphia officials said Texas authorities have not coordinated with them.

It’s likely that several travelers may disembark at stops along the way in other states. Only three people have reported Pennsylvania as their final destination, and others are expected to continue on to stops in New York, New Jersey, Massachusetts, and Maryland, the city said.

Since summer, the city Office of Immigrant Affairs and the Office of Emergency Management have been preparing for the potential arrival of migrants on unscheduled, unanticipated bus routes from Southern states. Those agencies have been meeting regularly to plan a response with 15 local community-based organizations, including Juntos, HIAS Pennsylvania, the Pennsylvania Immigration and Citizenship Coalition, and Nationalities Service Center

That planning intensified in recent days amid unconfirmed information that a bus would be headed here from Texas. Officials noted that a major city such as Philadelphia can easily welcome a single bus of arrivals.

The city and its partners “stand ready to welcome, assist, and provide support to these individuals and their families,” the city said in a statement.

Most of the people arriving in Philadelphia are expected to be traveling on to meet family members. All have legal means to be in the United States. Many if not all are seeking asylum and have passed “credible fear” interviews in order to be released into the interior United States.

That standard requires that immigrants show they face a real danger of being harmed in their homeland, or that they’ve already been harmed. And they must have been harmed in a certain way, such as because of their race, religion, or politics.

“The first Texas bus of migrants has departed for Philadelphia,” Abbott tweeted on Tuesday. “The Lone Star State will continue doing more than any state in history to secure our border, including adding more sanctuary cities as drop-off locations for our busing strategy.”

Aaron Reichlin-Melnick, policy director at the American Immigration Council, estimated that Texas has spent more than $2,166 per migrant to bus people to Washington, New York, and Chicago. “At that price,” he tweeted, “Texas could have bought each person multiple first-class plane tickets.”

Abbott’s office said he was sending the bus here as “part of the governor’s unprecedented response to President Biden’s open border policies overwhelming border communities in Texas.”

“Until the Biden Administration does its job and provides Texans and the American people with sustainable border security, Texas will continue doing more than any other state in the nation’s history to defend against an invasion along the border, including adding more sanctuary cities like Philadelphia as drop-off locations,” Abbott said in a statement.

He cited Kenney’s advocacy for Philadelphia’s role as a sanctuary city for “making the city an ideal addition to Texas’ list.” The Kenney administration fought and won a major lawsuit over the Trump administration’s effort to withhold grant money unless the city helped enforce federal immigration laws.

Sanctuary jurisdictions such as Philadelphia aim to treat undocumented migrants the same as everyone else when they come in contact with the legal system. Those cities and states say it’s illegal for them to detain migrants for arrest by ICE agents, absent a judge’s order.

In the spring, Abbott directed the Texas Division of Emergency Management to charter buses to transport migrants from Texas to Washington, D.C., and in August the governor added New York City and Chicago as destinations. Thousands of migrants have been sent to those cities, he said, “providing much-needed relief to Texas’ overwhelmed border communities.”

Immigration advocates call the buses a cruel trick, played on people who are pursuing legal immigration remedies and are simply trying to find their way to their families.

“Greg Abbott should be the loudest advocate for a humane immigration reform plan in Congress,” City Councilmember Helen Gym tweeted over the weekend. “Instead he’s spending $$ on these buses as a sick political stunt because he’s more invested in exploiting a problem than figuring out a real solution.”