Was the Texas Migrant Bus Program a Success?

August 25, 2024 – 9:15 PM

It appears that the movement of migrants from border states to blue cities was a turning point in public opinion on immigration, ultimately shifting Democrats to the right on the issue.

Texas Governor Greg Abbott has sent more than 102,000 migrants to U.S. cities in the two years since the program launched in April 2022. At the Republican National Convention in July, he promised, “Those buses will keep rolling until we finally secure our borders.”

But in July 2024, he failed to send a single migrant bus out of the state, despite reports that there were not enough migrants to send.

Border encounters have fallen significantly this summer from the historic highs of recent years, following a Biden administration push to limit asylum. Joe Biden campaigned on dismantling Donald Trump’s immigration restrictions, and the change in his tone on the issue coincided with a shift within the Democratic Party toward more restrictive immigration policies, in part because of Abbott’s busing program.

Migrant buses exploited an imbalance in U.S. immigration policy. Illegal border crossings have the most immediate and tangible impact on small, low-income border towns. Places like Del Rio, Texas, see an influx of migrants equal to 14 times their entire population each year. Meanwhile, large, wealthy urban areas far from the border advertise themselves as sanctuary cities, despite receiving proportionally few migrants. When they received a sudden influx of migrants, the Democratic mayors of these cities and their left-leaning constituents quickly changed their tune.

New York Mayor Eric Adams said in late 2023 that illegal immigration would “destroy New York City,” a statement that 58% of New Yorkers, including 46% of Democrats, agreed with in a subsequent poll. Locals told the New York Times that the surge in illegal immigrants was “unacceptable” and “a disgrace.” The Democratic mayors of Chicago and Denver joined Adams in calling on Biden to declare a federal emergency over the migrant crisis late last year.

Abbott wasn’t the only elected official to send migrants to the nation’s blue cities. The Democratic mayor of El Paso, Texas, busted more than 13,000 migrants to New York, Los Angeles and Denver in just three months in late 2023. Florida’s Republican governor, Ron DeSantis, drew a flood of criticism from across the country in 2022 after sending 48 Venezuelan immigrants to Martha’s Vineyard, a wealthy liberal enclave and self-described “sanctuary city.”

As immigration became more visible in major cities, it became a major national news story. Public opinion shifted across the board, with 51% of Americans, including 42% of Democrats, now supporting mass deportations. The share of Americans who said immigration should decrease, not increase, has risen from 28% in May 2020 to 55% in June 2024, according to Gallup.

Under pressure from other elected Democrats and the party’s base, the Biden administration has shifted its tone on the border over the past year, passing a series of reforms aimed at curbing illegal crossings, including a ban on migrants seeking asylum after crossing illegally when crossings are particularly high. Kamala Harris is campaigning as a border hawk, with one of her first ads touting her record against gang members and drug cartels. This shift by Democrats on immigration suggests that Abbott’s promise to turn the border crisis over to Biden has been a success overall.