The immigrant invasion of Massachusetts is to Gov. Maura Healey what the COVID-19 pandemic was to former Gov. Charlie Baker.
Both governors declared a state of emergency, Baker on March 10, Sept. 14, 2020, and Healey on August 8, 2023.
Both events consumed their time, political capital, budgets and energy, giving them little time to deal with a myriad of other issues demanding their attention.
The pandemic, which shut the state and the country down, arrived during Baker’s second and last term as governor, so he already had years of experience as chief executive.
In Healey’s case, the explosion of immigrants descending on an unprepared Massachusetts practically hit her in the face on the first day of the job over a year ago. She has been struggling with it ever since.
It was not even an issue in the 2022 campaign for governor in which she handily defeated Republican Geoff Diehl. Now it has exploded.
But the key difference is that President Joe Biden, promising to deal with the pandemic, signed his $1.9 trillion American Rescue Act that poured some $115 billion into Massachusetts under various federal programs for Baker.
So far, Healey, despite begging, has been unable to get even $115 dollars out of Biden.
Nor has the useless Massachusetts delegation to Washington, headed by Sens. Elizabeth Warren and Eddie Markey, done any better in wrangling money out of the Biden administration.
You would never know it, but U.S. Rep. Richard Neal of Springfield was the chairman of the powerful House Ways & Means Committee, which doles out billions, when the Democrats controlled the House. Now he is the ranking member. But there is no money for illegals.
Unlike the immigration crisis, the pandemic subsided and generally went away.
Open borders and illegal immigration are here to stay—at least as long as Joe Biden is president.
Biden on both issues failed to place the blame where it belongs. In the case of COVID, Biden has refused to hold the Communist Chinese responsible for the virus that emanated from its lab in Wuhan that killed millions of people in the U.S. and around the world.
Biden has also refused to take responsibility for the illegal invasion of the country that began on day one of his administration when he reversed policies put in place by President Donald Trump that had secured the border.
Instead, Biden is attempting to blame Trump for his decision to open the border, halt construction of the wall, and wave into the country millions of immigrants from everywhere, including criminals and terrorists.
The result has been the destabilization of cities and states across the country, some cities of which, like New York, Chicago and Boston once preened about being sanctuary havens for illegal immigrants. Now they are moaning.
And Biden, who created the problem, has ignored pleas from political leaders, many of whom are fellow Democrats and supporters like Healey, for financial relief.
Joe Biden has handed out more money ($8 billion) to the Taliban in Afghanistan than he has to Maura Healey in Massachusetts.
Yet she still supports him. And the situation worsens.
She would be better off telling Biden to shut the border down before the ongoing onslaught of illegal immigrants shuts Massachusetts down.
Martha’s Vineyard was the canary in the coal mine.
It was almost treated as a crime against humanity when Florida Gov. Ron DiSantis flew in some 50 illegal immigrants, mostly Venezuelans, from Texas to Martha’s Vineyard in 2022.
While welcomed, the Islanders could not get them off the island fast enough. Instead of sending them back to Texas or Venezuela, then Gov. Baker had them shipped to Joint Base Cape Cod where they could sign up for generous welfare benefits.
Since then, that batch of fifty immigrants arriving in Massachusetts to partake of its generous social welfare programs has grown to fifty thousand, and still counting. And no one is sent back.
Maybe Healey should tell Biden to just shut the door.
Peter Lucas is a veteran Massachusetts political reporter and columnist.
