Bus carrying 28 migrants from Texas arrives in Philadelphia

PHILADELPHIA – A bus carrying 28 migrants from Texas arrived in Philadelphia on Wednesday, including a 10year-old girl suffering from dehydration and a high fever who was whisked to a hospital for treatment.

Advocates who welcomed them with coats and blankets as they arrived before dawn on a cold, drizzly morning said the families and individuals came from Colombia, the Dominican Republic and Cuba. The city and several nonprofit groups were ready to provide food, temporary housing and other services.

“In general, people feel relieved. We want them to know that they have a home here,” said Philadelphia City Council member Helen Gym, who accompanied several of the migrants onto a second bus taking them to an intake center.

“There’s a 10-year-old who’s completely dehydrated. It’s one of the more inhumane aspects that they would put a child who was dehydrated with a fever now, a very high fever (on the bus),” Gym said.

Texas Gov. Greg Abbott announced on Tuesday that Philadelphia would be the next destination for migrants the state has been transporting by the thousands from the U.S.-Mexico border to Democrat-led cities, news that came a week after the Republican easily won reelection.

Texas has put more than 300 busloads of migrants on the road since April, sometimes five in a day, on unannounced journeys to cities including New York, Chicago and Washington, D.C. The trips have cost Texas about $26 million, according to Nim Kidd, chief of Texas Department of Emergency Management.

New York Mayor Eric Adams has accused Abbott’s office of being unwilling to coordinate to help them plan for the arrivals. Kidd, whose agency is overseeing the departures, said nongovernmental organizations on the Texas border are in touch with groups in destination cities.

“We have full confidence that the NGOs that we are working with are communicating with the NGOs in the places these buses are being delivered to,” Kidd told lawmakers Tuesday.