FOIA Finds FEMA Funding Millions to Illinois at the Request of House Democrats

It’s no surprise that the Department of Homeland Security and FEMA has been funding the immigration crisis in the United States. A recent FOIA response from the City of Chicago obtained by Terry Newsome of Behind Enemy Lines podcast confirms widespread reporting that FEMA has been doing just that for sanctuary states and cities across the country.

In the 70 pages of emails, FEMA’s “Office of Partnership and Engagement” corresponds with City of Chicago officials to alert them of the numbers of asylum seekers being sent to the city of Chicago and suburbs such as Naperville and Elgin. Over 5,000 asylum seekers were placed between February and April 2023. While the media and government attempted to gaslight the public by suggesting that the government was not funding the migrant invasion linked FOIA documents confirm, from government email addresses, that over $300 million went to communities receiving migrants.

An email briefing a Congressional Delegation on asylum seekers details that the City of Chicago requested a whopping $66 million to deal with the migrant crisis. By April of 2023 the City of Chicago had already spent $75 million settling immigrants and was spending a staggering $20 million per month to address the myriad needs of the newcomers including housing, food, and healthcare.

The question as to how much has been spent cumulatively is difficult to estimate. According to the City of City of Chicago’s Vendor Payments – New Arrivals Mission cost dashboard, the City has spent over $541 million from July 2022 to October of 2024. Previous reporting from Behind Enemy Lines and Gateway Pundit detailed the involvement of Catholic Charities and Obama Foundation affiliate NGOs working to place migrants into housing using some of these funds. However, as the previous reporting indicates, the federal government is subsidizing Catholic Charities by over $1 billion dollars as of 2021. It’s difficult to discern the total amount spent for the new welfare class being forced upon the American taxpayer but it’s likely reaching into the billions.

Most egregious however, is the revelation that the entire Chicago Federal delegation wrote a letter to DHS Secretary Mayorkas and the FEMA administrator asking for $20.5 million. The request was to use the Emergency Food and Shelter Program to fund the migrants coming from the southern border. All the while, Chicago’s homeless veterans have been freezing in the winter months while the City of Chicago, Catholic Charities, and Obama Foundation cutouts funnel non-citizens into housing paid for by Illinois and federal taxpayers. Cementing this unholy alliance is a majority Democrat governing body in Illinois which saw fit, through Public Act 103-0232, to make it a civil rights violation for property owners to discriminate based on “immigration status.” Legislation was likely needed in order for the government to properly manage the logistics of housing thousands upon thousands of new arrivals.

The irony should not escape the Illinois voter as November 5th looms. The juxtaposition of these representatives such as Chuy Garcia, Sean Casten, and Raja Krishnamoorthi asking for their constituents’ votes all while siphoning their tax dollars to pay for noncitizens is reflective of a dystopian idiocracy.

Further irony is on display as we hear about the lack of an effective response from FEMA to the disaster areas such as North Carolina after Hurricane Helene. Fox News recently interviewed a couple who were critical of the Federal response noting the lack of noticeable resources on the ground, and the dismal economic benefit of $750 considering the mounting costs of recovery. Speaking of costs, while reporting on supposed conspiracy theories about FEMA camps in regards to Hurricane Helene, NBC News accurately reported that, “…the government agency wrote that it has recently set up temporary housing for staff responding to the aftermath of Hurricane Helene in a few locations in western North Carolina.” This begs the question as to the cost of such construction as well as the effectiveness of such efforts given much of the reporting about the inefficiency to date.

It is altogether necessary to observe the contrast between the egregious amount of taxpayer funds spent on housing, feeding, and caring for non-citizens as our own citizens are offered an offensive pittance in the face of life threatening disaster. To suggest that agencies such as FEMA are being mismanaged is an understatement indeed. For the Illinois voter it’s imperative to spread the word about representatives who prioritize non-citizens over their own constituents. Furthermore, it’s worth contemplating whether or not they are setting such priorities as a means to introduce a new class of constituent at the cost of the current class.

Reprinted with permission from The Gateway Pundit by Jim Hoft.

The opinions expressed by columnists are their own and do not necessarily represent the views of AMAC or AMAC Action.