Arizona Will Keep Sending Illegal Immigrants out of State, New Governor Says

Illegal immigrants seeking asylum line up to be processed by U.S. Customs and Border Patrol agents at a gap in the border fence US-Mexico near San Luis, Arizona, on Dec. 26, 2022. Rebecca Noble/AFP via Getty Images

Arizona will continue transporting illegal immigrants out of the state’s border towns to major Democrat-led cities, but with some tweaks.

Following the steps of Texas Gov. Greg Abbott, in May 2022 then-Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey began offering illegal immigrants one-way bus tickets to Washington, D.C., saying that border communities were overwhelmed while receiving “little action or assistance from the federal government.”

Arizona Gov. Katie Hobbs, a Democrat, said at Jan. 20 press conference that she is open to keeping the busing program started by her Republican predecessor, so long as it’s verified to be effective and beneficial for those living along the border.

“We need to look at that practice and make sure that it’s effective, [that] it’s something that supports local communities,” Hobbs told reporters. “If we’re spending the money to bus people, why not just get them to their final destination?”

In a follow-up statement, a spokesperson for the governor’s office said that the Hobbs administration will make some changes to the program, including adding the option to transport the migrants to their desired destinations by air.

“We’re sending migrants to cities they actually need to go to and be connected with their sponsors, and we are doing it in a more cost effective way by looking at all travel options, not just buses,” Berry told the Arizona Republic.

In a contract signed on Jan. 13, the Hobbs administration renewed the busing of illegal immigrants from the southern border. The contract uses the same vendor as before, AMI Expeditionary Healthcare, but has additional terms allowing the vendor to use air transportation.

Under the agreement, AMI is expected to provide transportation via a Boeing 737 aircraft to a designated location approved by the Arizona Department of Emergency and Military Affairs, on a one-flight-per-month basis. The plane should be able to “support up to 150 immigrants plus support staff” and provide the passengers with “at least one meal” along the trip.

Arizona’s Container Wall Dismantled

While Ducey’s busing program lives on, his $82 million border wall consisting of thousands of shipping containers didn’t survive.

In August 2022, Ducey ordered to have “3,820 feet of the previously open border” near Yuma closed with 130 old shipping containers. That initiative had since been expanded to other parts of the border until the governor agreed to remove them.

The de-facto border wall was the target of a federal lawsuit, in which the U.S. Department of Justice accused the Ducey administration of erecting barriers that “violate federal law, present serious public safety risks and environmental harms, and interfere with federal agencies’ ability to carry out their official duties.” In response to the legal action, Ducey’s office called off the construction.

“Arizona agencies and contractors stand ready to assist in the removal of the barriers,” Ducey wrote in a letter to the federal government. “But the federal government owes it to Arizonans and all Americans to release a timeline on when construction will begin and details about how it will secure the border while construction is underway.”