I Have A Few Questions About The Martha’s Vineyard Migrant Kerfuffle
David Harsanyi, The federalist
A person can make a compelling case that dropping unsuspecting migrants off in places like Chicago or San Francisco is cruel, but Martha’s Vineyard? Isn’t it more humane to send migrants to well-heeled communities than to allow them to live in “squalor” in makeshift tent cities under highway overpasses? Because I rarely hear the left worry about the latter.
Then again, why has a story about 50 migrants spending a couple of days on Martha’s Vineyard garnered far more coverage and outrage from the media and left punditry than 51 migrants being cooked alive in a tractor-trailer only last month?
Why is it barely news that officials dumped 1,000 migrants into the streets of El Paso to fend for themselves the very same day those 50 people arrived in beautiful Martha’s Vineyard? Is it humane that some Texas cities see 200,000 newcomers every month or that places like Del Rio, Texas, with a population of nearly 35,000, are forced to house nearly 50,000 newcomers in “squalid conditions” when pristine sanctuary cities are asked to do nothing?
The White House says Ron DeSantis is using the “tactics we see from smugglers in places like Mexico and Guatemala.” If the governor of Florida is guilty of “human trafficking” for flying 50 migrants to one of the wealthiest communities in the United States what do we call the Biden administration’s policy of sending 70 secret chartered planes of migrants to Florida in the middle of the night?
Chuck Todd claims that sending migrants to Martha’s Vineyard is “inhumane” because it’s “a literal island that doesn’t have any infrastructure.” If the island can’t handle an influx of 50 migrants, a “humanitarian crisis” says the community, how on Earth is it able to host 150,000 tourists every summer? Scratch that, how is it able to host the thousands of tourists who continue to visit the island in the Fall? There are numerous rentals and hotels in operation right now that could easily house 50 people.
If wealthy cocooned left-wing voters support anarchy at the border, don’t they have a moral and societal obligation to also take on the burden of helping integrate, care and guide those newcomers? We’re in this together, after all. Shouldn’t municipalities that virtue signal with declarations of “sanctuary city” be prepared to live up to their designation?
And if the people of Martha’s Vineyard are welcoming generous salt-of-the-earth types, why is it “cruel” to send them immigrants? How many of these migrants are going to end up settling down on the island? If they, unlike nefarious Republicans, are the true Christians for hosting 50 people for nearly two days, what does that make the citizens of Texas border towns or the people of Arizona, New Mexico, or Florida, who house hundreds of thousands of amnesty seekers and illegal immigrants?
And, yes, I’m begging the questions.
David Harsanyi is a senior editor at The Federalist. Harsanyi is a nationally syndicated columnist and author of five books—the most recent, Eurotrash: Why America Must Reject the Failed Ideas of a Dying Continent. His work has appeared in National Review, the Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, Reason, New York Post, and numerous other publications. Follow him on Twitter, @davidharsanyi.
