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  6.  » NYC’s Roosevelt Hotel becomes epicenter of city’s 60,000-strong refugee crisis in shocking scenes from Manhattan

NYC’s authorities say more than 93,000 asylum seekers came through the intake system last Spring

  • The desperate people looking to get inside the hotel early on Tuesday morning were speaking a number of languages, including Spanish, French, and Arabic 
  • Swathes of asylum seekers lined the streets sleeping on cardboard overnight because the NYC migrant hotel has reached capacity

Melissa Koenig and Claudia Auraha – Daily Mail Aug 1, 2023

Hundreds of migrants have been sleeping outside of Manhattan’s Roosevelt Hotel for a second day in a row – as NYC Mayor Eric Adams said the crisis is ‘not over.’

Swathes of asylum seekers, hailing from a number of South American and African countries, lined the streets sleeping on cardboard overnight because the migrant hotel has reached capacity.

‘I want a better life,’ one migrant told DailyMail.com from the queue outside the chaotic migrant epicenter on Tuesday morning.

The immense number of migrants arriving from southern states continues to rise – as a result of policies that caused thousands of asylum seekers to overrun the US-Mexico border.

New York City is currently housing more than 56,000 migrants across around 200 makeshift sites – while thousands more are in the city’s shelter system. But buses keep arriving week-on-week transporting people from the border.

NYC worker hands out food to migrants in Midtown Manhatten. Click to enlarge

The Roosevelt Hotel, which was shuttered three years ago, is one of several hotels that have been transformed into emergency centers as the city struggles with an influx of migrants.

New York is bound by a decades-old consent decree in a class-action lawsuit to provide shelter for those without homes.

As a result, the Roosevelt Hotel and others have become hubs for refugees – within walking distance from Times Square, the World Trade Center memorial site and the Empire State Building.

Over the weekend, the migrants were handed small red tickets with digits on them – and once in a while hotel workers would come out and call numbers to let people inside the air-conditioned lobby.

Others, desperately pushing closer to the front to get inside, were left to wait outside in the New York City heat.

The desperate people looking to get inside the hotel early on Tuesday morning were speaking a number of languages, including Spanish, French and Arabic.

Mahmouth, a migrant from Diungame in Senegal, has been waiting on the streets of New York City for five days, desperate for a spot to rest his head.

He told DailyMail.com: ‘We’re night and day here. I don’t know what’s going to happen now.’

Savi Khalil, from Mauritania, arrived in New York two months ago, before being transferred to Ohio and moving back to the Big Apple. He was living in the Magma Hotel in Queens before being thrown out.

He told DailyMail.com from the line on Tuesday: ‘They moved all of us out – they said they wanted to move a family in.’

Khalil was then put into one of the city’s shelters but has tried his shot at getting into the Roosevelt Hotel.

He added: ‘My friends said they’ve been here 3 days. They slept here on the street for three days. I want a better life. I wish them a better life. We are suffering in our country.

‘We don’t have nothing to protect us from the heat. We can’t stay here night after night. The application process is so slow. Since the morning, they haven’t taken one person and more people keep coming.’

When asked why he wants to migrate to the US, he said the country is a ‘place of freedom and dignity.’

Troy Vargas, who arrived from Venezuela, said that New York City is ‘beautiful’ and it has been his dream to work here.

He said from the Midtown Manhattan street: ‘I want to work in the United States and learn.’

Mohammed Fatima, who hails from Bhutan in South Asia, has so far spent three nights on the streets.

NYC currently houses more than 56,000 migrants in 200 makeshift shelters with buses from the border bringing more each day. Click to enlarge

He told DailyMail.com: ‘I want a break, we sleep on the streets it’s hard. I want to rest, I want to sleep. I want any place to sleep.

‘I came to America, a free and democratic country. I love America more than my country.’

Eric Adams said in a statement on Monday: ‘Children and families continue to be prioritized and are found a bed every night.

‘While we at least offered all adults a temporary place to wait off the sidewalks last night, some may have chosen to sleep outside.

‘And, in all honesty, New Yorkers may continue to see that more and more as hundreds of asylum seekers continue to arrive each day.’

Many have now spent two nights sleeping on the streets of New York, after being dropped off on buses from the southern border in Texas. Unless they are inside the hotel, many have been refused entry to use the restroom inside.

One migrant, named Mary who traveled from Venezuela, told The City that she was in floods of tears after hotel workers refused her use the restroom at 2am. She wandered the streets looking for somewhere else to use the toilet.

A group of men, from Chad in Africa, huddled around a gutter to wash their feet before praying in the line on Saturday amid their long wait to get inside.

The long line of migrants hail from many different countries – including Venezuela, Ecuador, Sudan, Bhutan, Mauritania, and Senegal.

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