What A Day - NYC Sues Over Migrant Buses

Episode Date: January 5, 2024

ISIS claimed responsibility for the bombings in Iran that killed at least 84 people and injured 284 others on Wednesday. Plus, the United States launched a drone strike in Iraq’s capital of Baghdad on Thursday, killing a senior commander of an Iran-linked militia group and several others.New York City Mayor Eric Adams announced Thursday that he filed a lawsuit against 17 charter bus companies used by Texas Governor Greg Abbott to bus people seeking asylum at the border to New York. Adams is asking the companies to pay $708 million to cover the costs of caring for migrants.And in headlines: Donald Trump’s businesses received more than $7.8 million from at least 20 foreign governments during his time in office, a 17-year-old gunman opened fire at a high school in Iowa on Thursday, and Britney Spears took to social media to shut down rumors of a new comeback album.Show Notes:Get free COVID tests from the U.S. government – https://covidtests.gov/What A Day – YouTube – https://www.youtube.com/@whatadaypodcastFollow us on Instagram – https://www.instagram.com/crookedmedia/For a transcript of this episode, please visit crooked.com/whataday

It's Friday, January 5th. I'm Josie Duffy Rice. And I'm Priyanka Arabindi. And this is What A Day, the podcast that asks Peloton instructors out there, please only say nice things about What A Day. Yeah, because Christopher Nolan said yesterday that he was once in a class and the instructor panned one of his films. If I was doing an incredibly hard workout and someone was there insulting my life's work,

yeah, I'd freak the fuck out. I'm sorry. I get it, I'd freak the fuck out. I'm sorry. I get it. I get why he's upset. On today's show, officials in New York, Chicago, and more take action to prevent Republicans and other states from busing migrants their way. Plus, new evidence shows Trump raked in millions from foreign governments during his presidency. New evidence, but a story many of us who are paying attention are familiar with.

Yeah. But first, we have many updates from all over the Middle East. First, ISIS claimed responsibility for the bombings in Iran near the burial site of former military commander Qasem Soleimani earlier this week. We told you about that attack yesterday. The two bombs killed at least 84 people and injured 284 others on Wednesday. That death toll number was revised by Iran's interior minister yesterday. And that attack was the deadliest within Iran since the 1979 Islamic revolution.

Some important context here. ISIS is a Sunni Muslim extremist group. Iran, on the other hand, is a majority Shiite Muslim country. Soleimani, the man whose death was being commemorated by these people before this attack, was responsible for building an alliance of Shiite Muslim militant groups all around the region, so he was certainly not somebody that these Sunni groups cared for whatsoever. This is not the first time that groups affiliated with the Islamic State have claimed responsibility for attacks within Iran. Prior to this week, the most recent one was in October of 2022 when a gunman in the city of Shiraz killed 13 people. Yeah, this is pretty different than the initial assumptions, right, by some Iranian leaders and others who thought that this attack was basically launched by Israel. Is that correct? Right. I mean, President Abraham Raisi of Iran and other leaders were very quick to blame Israel for

the attack initially. For some context, Iran backs Hamas, which is the same group that Israel has been waging war with in Gaza since October. And earlier this week, Israel carried out a strike on a Hamas leader in Lebanon. So lots happening in the region. But Israel was not responsible here. And American officials don't believe that ISIS was trying to, you know, pin this on Israel during this period of unrest, or spur a wider war in the region. They think that the group was just using the anniversary of Soleimani's death to make their point. You mentioned that strike on a Hamas leader in Lebanon that also happened recently. So what more can you tell us about that and the fallout from that as well? Yeah,

something, you know, many people have been watching very closely in the past couple days. In a speech yesterday, the head of Hezbollah, which is the dominant militant group in Lebanon, Hassan Nasrallah, vowed, quote, response and punishment after the drone strike, which was believed to have been launched by Israel. Israel hasn't officially taken responsibility. Doing so comes with a whole host of other issues. But there are a lot of fears about what could follow this strike, the fallout that you mentioned. This attack took place in a densely populated residential area in Beirut. While Hezbollah and the IDF have traded fire across the border for a while, up until this week, nothing like this had hit the capital.

Lebanon also is a sovereign nation. Israel is not officially at war with them at this point. We hope it stays that way. So this is a very tense moment that this is adding into. But the violence, you know, still continues to mount with the U.S. actually getting involved elsewhere as well. That's the other big news, right? There was a U.S. drone strike in Baghdad yesterday, which when I heard that, it brought back some memories of hearing U.S. drone strikes in Baghdad. Can you tell us more about what happened there? Like why the U.S. got involved? Yeah. So U.S. special ops launched an airstrike of their own in Iraq's capital of Baghdad yesterday. They killed a senior commander and several others

in an Iran linked militia group. That group has claimed responsibility for several attacks on American forces in the past. They are designated by the U.S. as a terrorist organization. And the Pentagon said that yesterday's strike was in self-defense. They added that no civilians were harmed. Of course, Iraqi leadership is not happy about a strike by the U.S. in their capital, especially given the context of this week and what just happened in Beirut. A spokesperson for the Iraqi government called the attack a, quote, flagrant violation of the sovereignty and security of Iraq, and, quote, no different from a terrorist act. U.S. strikes abroad are not anything new. In the past few weeks alone,

there have been over 70 attacks on U.S. bases and camps in Iraq and Syria by similar armed groups, also backed by Iran. The U.S. military has sent strikes and taken other military action in response. But they've avoided doing anything like this in Baghdad itself recently because, you know, it's such a densely populated area. And now this latest strike risks further aggravating an already very volatile situation in the region, especially given the U.S.'s ongoing funding and support of Israel's military action in Gaza. Just a lot going on here. We will, of course, continue to keep you updated on the latest in the region. Now we're going to talk about the continuing crisis

that Republican governors are creating by sending migrants to other states. First, New York City Mayor Eric Adams announced Thursday that he filed a lawsuit against 17 charter bus companies used by Texas Governor Greg Abbott to bus people seeking asylum at the border to New York. The suit claims that the bus companies are receiving about five times the cost of a ticket from Texas to New York for each passenger they send. They're getting about $1,600 for each passenger versus the $300 ticket that it would normally cost, according to the suit. And it alleges bad faith and, quote, evil intention on the part of the bus companies for participating in Abbott's busing scheme. But what is the result that Eric Adams is looking for? Is he, you know, hoping that these companies will stop busing migrants to New York?

You know, what is he looking for? Yeah, so that's part of it. But he's also asking the companies to pay the estimated cost of, quote, caring. And I say caring in quotes because the care has not been so caring at some points. Right. But the estimated cost of, quote, caring for these migrants thus far, which according to the lawsuit, is an estimated $708 million. I think it's worth mentioning, like, this isn't my area of legal expertise, but this is a stretch of a lawsuit and certainly not like a definite win for the city. But I'm assuming that part of the hope is that it incentivizes these companies to stop doing this if they have to fight a lawsuit

about this. Like even if they win in the end, it's a lot of money, it's a lot of effort, and it makes it less lucrative, right, to be part of this pattern. Yeah, and especially staring down the barrel of like a $708 million cost that they could incur, you know, may just reinforce that these companies have done something bad. Right. And you know, all of this comes after Governor Abbott and a few other border state governors, including Ron DeSantis, have been busing and sometimes flying migrants north for many months now, particularly to big cities like New York and Chicago. Yeah, this has been going on for a while,

and it has led to cities and states pushing back on this practice. So this is just like one of the latest tactics to get it to stop. They're basically trying all the creative ways that they can to end this policy, right? And as we've talked about before on the show, shelters in these cities remain packed

and resources to support these migrants who are, again, seeking asylum. That's a very key part of this. They're very, very limited. In fact, Chicago as of Tuesday is housing about 15,000 asylum seekers and 27 shelters. So imagine that's 15,000 people in 27 shelters. That's going to be really, really packed, right? And due to the limited space, a few hundred migrants that were recently bused to Chicago have been sleeping inside city buses while they await space and shelter. So to be clear, these are not the charter buses. These are regular Chicago city buses that are being turned into, quote, warming buses at night for migrants to sleep. They're sleeping in a bus, A, so that's horrible. It's also winter in Chicago, January in Chicago, freezing, I can say from firsthand experience. So this is

very clearly not a comfortable or humane situation. I mean, I'm sure people are trying to do the best with what they can, but this is not by any means okay. The city is calling them warming buses, but like you said, I have my doubts about how warm they could possibly be. Right. And like you said, it's very clear that this is a crisis situation for people who are seeking asylum, given that these cities just don't have the necessary infrastructure. And meanwhile, many suburbs of New York and Chicago are straight up rejecting migrants from even entering.

So in Rockford, Illinois, local officials said that the approximately 350 migrants who arrived on a flight to the town would simply not be allowed to stay. In Grundy County, Illinois, there are signs on the highway that state, quote, no migrant buses this exit, basically warning the buses just not to stop there. And in Edison, New Jersey, the mayor, quote, warned he would send people back to the border if they came to his city in buses, according to the Associated Press.

It's very clear that these governors are just treating these buses full of people like they are pawns, moving them around to, you know, get people to reject them or to fill up shelters and stress these cities out and try to make a point using people who are oftentimes confused, don't know what's happening to them, just like innocent people who

really have done nothing wrong. It is cruel and it's disgusting. It really is. It feels just very heartbreaking for people who, again, are seeking asylum from where they came from. They are already coming from very difficult situations. Yeah. And is Governor Abbott sending these buses to the suburbs anyways? What's going on with that? The reason that these buses are going to the New York suburbs, at least, has to do with a new executive order that Eric Adams signed last week that basically requires these buses to, quote, provide 32 hours notice in advance of their arrival. And it also limited the hours that they can arrive in the city to between 8.30 a.m. and noon. And that comes after 14 buses arrived in New York City in one night last month.

So basically making it more difficult for these buses to show up at any point. And as a result, Governor Abbott is having these buses go to the suburbs, largely in Jersey, dropping migrants off at the train station and then having them get to New York that way. So this just basically seems like every kind of tactic that these cities are using to try to limit how many migrants are coming in from Governor Abbott's political policy scheme thing. Basically, every time that they try to limit that, he's finding another way to get them in. Right. So you can't come in on the bus, then we'll drop you off in the suburbs, you can go by the train. you can't come in on the bus then we'll drop up in the suburbs you can go the train right can't come on the bus we'll take the plane like

it's just he just keeps going it really never stops yeah what happens now i'm like scared to even ask what yeah where do we go from here i think we don't know right like what point this stops or is alleviated i mean abbott is basically infuriating governors and mayors left and right up north, which, of course, is 100% his goal. I mean, he's loving how furious he's making people. And meanwhile, of course, there's the federal fight over migration at the border, which still continues. And the Biden administration also has a lot to say about this local situation, too. And they're fed up with Governor Abbott as well. So here's Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas in an interview with MSNBC on Wednesday.

We have one governor in the state of Texas who is refusing to cooperate with other governors and other local officials and coordinate efforts to address a challenge that our country, which this country should stand united to address, that our country is facing. And it's a remarkable failure of governance to refuse to cooperate with one's fellow local and state officials. More on all of this very soon, but that is the latest for now. We will be back after some ads. Let's get to some headlines. Headlines. Because he is the guy we know he is, businesses owned by former President Donald Trump received

more than $7.8 million from at least 20 foreign governments during his time in office. That is according to a new report released by Democrats on the House Oversight Committee yesterday. In the report, called White House for Sale, House Dems said that China made the largest total payment of $5.5 million at Trump properties and businesses, including the Trump Tower in New York and the Trump International Hotel in Washington, D.C., among others. The report also found that Saudi Arabia spent more than $600,000 at Trump properties and Qatar, Kuwait, India and Malaysia shelled out more than $200,000 each. The Constitution, that little document that

conservatives claim to love, prohibits any person holding office from accepting payments or gifts from foreign governments without the consent of Congress. And according to the report, Trump never once went to Congress to get its consent while holding office. This, of course, comes as Republicans continue their impeachment inquiry into President Biden, of all people, which, as an important reminder, has not turned up any evidence of wrongdoing at all. A 17-year-old gunman opened fire at a high school in Iowa on Thursday, killing a sixth grader and wounding five other people, including the school's principal. According to local police, the shooter was a student at Perry High School, where the tragedy took place. He was found dead at the scene with a shotgun, a handgun, and a, quote,

improvised explosive device on his person. Authorities believe that he died from a self-inflicted gunshot wound, but they gave no details on his potential motive. This all comes just as students were getting back in the classroom after winter break. If it feels like everyone you know is getting sick with COVID right now, you are not wrong. We have some data to back that up. The U.S. is currently in the midst of yet another winter COVID uptick, and the new dominant variant known as JN1 is responsible for nearly half of all COVID cases in the country. But thankfully, the uptick appears to be less deadly as compared to this time last year, and fewer people are being

hospitalized. So let's break down some of the numbers. In the week before Christmas, the CDC reported about 29,000 COVID hospitalizations compared with 39,000 the same time a year prior and 61,000 the year before that. But a minimum of 1,200 COVID-related deaths are still happening each week, though that is about one-third of the COVID deaths this time last year. So the TLDR here is that COVID is on the rise right now all across the country, and experts are encouraging folks to mask up, get vaccinated against both COVID and the flu. And if you feel remotely sick, please, please, please stay home. Stay away from other people. Do not spread that around.

And if you have not already, you can get your free at-home COVID test from the government by going to COVIDtest.gov to place your order. I'm going to be doing that right after we finish recording. We will also include the link to that in our show notes. And finally, in some devastating news for the Britney Spears army, the former pop star took to social media yesterday to shut down rumors of a new comeback album. This comes after numerous tabloids reported that Spears was. The former pop star took to social media yesterday to shut down rumors of a new comeback album. This comes after numerous tabloids reported that Spears was working with industry

icons like Charli XCX and Julia Michaels on a new record that would have been her first in over a decade. And many of her fans have wondered if Spears would come out with more music, especially after releasing a new song with Will.i.am last year. You might remember that the pair shocked everyone when they dropped Mind Your Business in July. I have

to say i everyone and not me i don't remember it i me either i'm just learning of this now apparently we talked about it on the show is what i was told raven our producer told me that just now i you know it's me guys i'm sorry a lot's happened since july okay wouldn't know this song if it slapped me across the face anyways here's took to instagram to set the record straight, saying, quote, I will never return to the music industry. When I write, I write for fun or I write for other people. She also went on to say that she prefers to be a ghostwriter for other artists without

putting her name on any projects. So sadly, according to the queen herself, it's no longer Britney, bitch. It's over, bitch. I mean, that's funny, but this is sad. I mean, her experience was so ruined that she, who like a true titan, a true icon, one of the biggest pop performers of our era, is like, sorry, that shit sucked and I'm never doing it again. It's sad. It really is sad.

You know, it is sad. I just want to say, never say never, Brittany. Never say never. Brittany's Instagram, not the most reliable source of permanent news. So I just feel like... I mean, she was skinny as a needle, though. That's true. Still is. Still is.

In the meantime, I'll just be playing scream and shout because I don't know what Mind Your Business is. I don't know what Mind Your Business is, but I do know what sometimes is. 1999, anybody? And those are the headlines. One more thing before we go. With less than two weeks to go until this year's Iowa caucuses,

Pod Save America's Dan Pfeiffer and Tommy Vitor are covering Trump's removal from the ballots in Maine and Colorado and are breaking down Joe Biden's re-election strategy. Then MSNBC's Steve Kornacki stops by to geek out over the latest voter data and what it might mean for the 2024 presidential election. Head over to the Pod Save America feed now to listen. That's all for today. If you like the show, make sure you subscribe, leave a review. But if you're

a Peloton instructor, leave only good reviews and tell your friends to listen. And if you're into reading and not just Britney's writing for ghosts like me, What A Day is also a nightly newsletter. Check it out and subscribe at crooked.com slash subscribe. I'm Priyanka Arabindi. I'm Josie Duffy Rice. And be kind to us, Cody. Please, I can't take it. If Cody didn't like us, I don't know what I'd do with myself. What a Day is a projection of Crooked Media. It's recorded and mixed by Bill Lance. Our show's producer is Idsi Kintania. Raven Yamamoto and Natalie Bettendorf are our associate producers.

And our showrunner is Leo Duran. Our theme music is by Colin Gilliard and Kshaka.