President Biden is facing increased pressure to use his authority to either support legislation or unilaterally enact proposals that would advance efforts to give reparations to Black Americans as a way to make amends for slavery and racism.

The campaign for cities and states to pay reparations at a more local level is gaining major momentum as a growing number of communities across the country weigh payment proposals. 

Meanwhile, lawmakers at the federal level have introduced their own measures. Most recently, Rep. Cori Bush, D-Mo., introduced a proposal in May to pay $14 trillion to compensate for what she believes are racist government policies that created a wealth gap between White and Black people. Less ambitiously, several Democrats in Congress have backed a bill establishing a commission to study and develop reparations proposals for lawmakers to consider implementing.

However, Biden has largely been silent about such initiatives, leading to frustration among pro-reparations activists and some Democrats in Congress — especially amid great energy at the state and local levels to advance such measures.

‘Activists have been pressing the Biden administration to use his executive authority to immediately establish a federal reparations commission given the deliberate stalling at the congressional level,’ Dreisen Heath, an expert and leading reparations activist, recently told Fox News Digital.

Racial justice groups and some Democrats have been pushing Biden for years to establish a national reparations commission by executive order — so far to no avail.

‘We ask with no apologies for an executive order to be in place,’ Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee, D-Texas, said in December. ‘I want for once an acceptance of the history, of the journey that African Americans have taken, to be an accepted reality in America.’

Months later, the National Council of Churches USA, Faith for Black Lives, and more than 200 faith leaders from across the country issued a letter to Biden calling on him to establish a reparations commission by executive order on or before the Juneteenth holiday on une 19, 2023.

Just days after the letter, civil rights leaders gathered outside a historic church in Selma, Alabama, to urge Biden to sign an executive order to study reparations for Black Americans.

Descendants of slaves have also slammed Biden for not acting on reparations.

The White House didn’t respond to a request for comment for this story to clarify Biden’s position on reparations. However, the White House has previously indicated Biden, who’s largely been quiet about the issue, supports studying potential reparations for Black Americans but has stopped short of saying he’d back a bill introduced in Congress that would create such a commission.

Last month, White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre repeatedly dodged a question concerning whether Biden would support financial reparations being paid to the descendants of Black slaves in the U.S.

In March, Jean-Pierre similarly failed to answer a question about whether Biden supports slavery reparations at a national level.

Pressure on Biden and the White House to act will likely mount as a growing number of localities add their names to the list of those actively pursuing reparations.

The latest example is Ann Arbor, home of the sprawling University of Michigan. Local outlet MLive.com obtained emails from city council members revealing they’ve been considering reparations for several months.

‘As I previously shared with you, one of my main priorities on council has been to start a task force to help the city identify how we can pay reparations to our Black community,’ one council member wrote in a Jan. 23 email to a University of Michigan social work professor.

In Georgia, the Fulton County Board of Commissioners voted last week in favor of $210,000 in funding toward a reparations study to discern if reparations are necessary for some Fulton County residents who are descended from slaves.

And in New York City, the Department of Health is reportedly pushing reparations as an answer to racial and wealth inequities among New Yorkers.

Beyond New York City, the state legislature in New York passed a bill last month that would create a commission to study the effects of slavery and racial discrimination in the Empire State and make recommendations for potential reparations, such as restitution payments from the government. The commission’s recommendations would be non-binding, meaning the legislature would decide whether to take them up for a vote.

Gov. Kathy Hochul is reportedly reviewing the bill but hasn’t commented publicly on the legislation, which needs her signature to become law. If Hochul signs the bill, New York would be the second state to establish a reparations commission, following California’s lead.

Late last month, California’s reparations ask force, which has been examining the possibility of implementing statewide reparations, released its final recommendations for the state legislature to consider and potentially send to the governor’s desk to be signed into law.

In its approximately 1,000-page report, the task force proposed dozens of statewide policies and ways to calculate monetary reparations designed to redress slavery and historical injustices against Black Americans. According to the task force, such history has created lingering consequences that exist today in the form of systemic racism.

Critics counter that reparations proposals are fiscally unmanageable and don’t make sense by having people who never owned slaves pay money to others who never were slaves as way to atone for slavery.

Still, the task force estimated the minimum dollar amount in harm that California has caused or could have prevented totals at least $1 million per eligible Black Californian.

Beyond cash payments, the task force recommended a variety of other reparations proposals, such as ending the prosecution of low-level crimes and mandating ‘anti-bias training’ as a graduate requirement for medical school, among other measures.

While New York and California are the only states actively pursuing a comprehensive statewide reparations plan, several areas across the country may follow suit at the local level — and at least one city has already begun implementing reparations.

The Chicago suburb of Evanston in 2019 committed to spend $10 million over 10 years on local reparations. Two years later, it became the first U.S. city of any size to fund reparations, specifically $25,000 for qualifying Black residents for home repairs, property down payments and interest or late penalties due on city property.

Now, Evanston has become the first city to actually start paying reparations. City staff have met with 48 recipients who are each eligible for the $25,000, and 16 of them received payments this week, according to the Evanston RoundTable. The city expects to dole out the reparations to 140 mostly elderly residents by the end of this year out of about 75,000 total, officials told the Wall Street Journal.

Evanston is the first city of any kind to deliver on reparations, but San Francisco could be the first major U.S. city to fund such a policy as its own local commission explores potentially doling out millions of dollars each to qualifying Black residents.

Beyond San Francisco, some California cities — such as Oakland, Los Angeles and Sacramento — have been pushing their own reparations initiatives even as the state advances its own payment plan.

In Maryland, meanwhile, legislation to create a state reparations commission has died twice in the General Assembly in the past two years. However, Greenbelt in 2021 became the first city in Maryland to vote for setting up a commission that will study paying reparations. Baltimore did the same in May.

Last week, the Caucus of African American Leaders voted unanimously to present a reparations resolution to Maryland officials, seeking programs to address the effects of slavery among Black residents. The resolution will reportedly be presented soon to Annapolis Mayor Gavin Buckley, and then to Gov. Wes Moore and Anne Arundel County Executive Steuart Pittman in August.

Elsewhere on the East Coast, Asheville, North Carolina, and Providence, Rhode Island, have each committed millions of dollars to their own local reparations programs.

Regarding Asheville specifically, commissioners in Buncombe County, where Asheville is located, are now preparing to conduct a ‘harm audit’ for county policies and procedures as a recommendation from the Community Reparations Commission, according to local TV station WLOS. The goal of the audit is to examine policies and practices that harm the Black community, with the county and the city of Asheville splitting the cost of the contract.

As for reparations at the federal level, they appear stalled amid widespread Republican opposition, only partial support among Democrat lawmakers, and an unclear level of support from the president.

New York City Mayor Eric Adams announced Wednesday that his administration is putting out new posters telling migrants to ‘consider another city’ and warning of high costs for housing, food and transportation in the Big Apple as it struggles to deal with its share of illegal immigrants.

‘We have no more room in the city,’ Adams stressed at a press conference, calling for economic support from the federal government and a ‘decompression strategy’ across the country.

Adams rolled out the posters, which outline how over 90,000 migrants have hit the city since April last year, and said, ‘There is no guarantee we will be able to provide shelter and services to new arrivals.’ 

‘Housing in NYC is very expensive,’ the posters say.

‘The cost of food, transportation, and other necessities in NYC is the highest in the United States,’ it says.

‘Please consider another city as you make your decision about where to settle in the U.S.,’ said the city, which supporters of large-scale immigration have noted holds the Statue of Liberty.

As of July 16, the city says it has over 54,800 migrants in care, with 188 sites set up to accommodate them. There were more than 2,800 migrants entering NYC care last week alone. It’s a small number compared to the hundreds of thousands that hit the border each month, but it has left the city overwhelmed — with Adams having called for federal help for months. 

Adams said the flyers ‘honestly communicate our city’s situation to those thinking of coming here.’ He said the posters will be handed out on the border and put on social media.

‘This will help to reduce disinformation and is another effort we are making in the absence of federal action,’ he said.

Adams also announced that adult migrants will also be given 60 days notice to find alternative housing, accompanied by ‘intensive’ case management services.

New York City has been a main destination for many of the millions of migrants that have hit the southern border as part of the historic migrant crisis since 2001. 

That has been exacerbated by efforts by Texas to send migrants to ‘sanctuary’ jurisdictions, including NYC, as part of its own efforts to relieve the pressure on the border state. Adams and Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis have argued that it is right that so-called sanctuary cities bear the brunt of the migrant crisis that Republicans believe such jurisdictions have encouraged.

‘They attacked the previous administration’s efforts to try to have border security. And so that’s the policies they’re staking out,’ DeSantis said last month. ‘And then what? When they have to deal with some of the fruits of that, they all of a sudden become very, very upset about that?’

Adams and Texas Gov. Greg Abbott have feuded over the migrant transports. On Wednesday, Adams accused border states of carrying out a ‘funnel system’ to send migrants to cities like New York City, Los Angeles, Washington D.C., Houston and Chicago.

‘This cannot continue, it is not sustainable and we are not going to pretend it is sustainable,’ he said.

The posters come as official Customs and Border Protection (CBP) statistics show that there were more than 144,000 migrant encounters at the border in June alone. That number is down from prior Junes and from May, and marks the lowest numbers since February 2021 — but numbers still remain high compared to pre-2021 numbers. 

An extensive reorganization of Iowa’s state government to streamline services is complete and already translating into improvements after just three months, Gov. Kim Reynolds said, even as some continue to worry that the massive transition consolidates the governor’s power and diminishes accountability.

Reynolds proposed the alignment as one of her top priorities at the beginning of the year, envisioning the shrinking of departments from 37 to 16 and the elimination of more than 500 positions. She signed the bill into law on April 4 after it passed in the Legislature without any substantive changes.

The 16 beefed-up agencies are now fully operational, Reynolds said, and already seeing ‘measurable outcomes.’

‘I think it’s sometimes difficult to grasp the size and scope of this undertaking, especially with such an aggressive timeline,’ Reynolds said Tuesday. ‘The most compelling reasons why alignment is the right thing to do for Iowans are the early success stories that we’re hearing across state government.’

Reynolds also unveiled a new state logo with the tagline ‘Freedom to Flourish,’ which she said will bring all of the departments together under one unified brand and communicate ‘a motivating message that in Iowa, you can reach your potential.’

What are the Core Departments?

The administration touts the reorganization as an effort to eliminate redundancies across the agencies by allowing areas with commonalities to be housed under the same roof and be subject to consistent oversight, technologies and procedures.

In particular, the Department of Inspections, Appeals and Licensing has absorbed many of the licensing services that had been in other departments. The director, Larry Johnson, said Tuesday that they have already seen dramatic cuts in case backlogs and in the average response time to requests.

Johnson said they have a ‘leaner and more efficient’ process after they took ‘talented, passionate, hardworking public servants who were doing similarly situated work as their counterparts in other departments, put them together, questioned the process with the goal of improving our services.’

The Division of Labor, Division of Workers’ Compensation, and Civil Rights Commission have also been folded into Johnson’s department.

The Department of Education and the Department of Health and Human Services both ballooned in size and scope as well.

Each department has their own director to oversee all operations within the new agency’s scope. That director is appointed by the governor and serves at her pleasure, the new law specifies.

What are the Benefits?

The state said the reorganization is projected to save more than $200 million over the next four years, largely by eliminating the roughly 500 positions that had been unfilled.

Kelly Garcia, the director of health and human services, said divisions were doing overlapping work for years before the consolidation.

They ‘were duplicative or disparate, they were disjointed,’ Garcia said. ‘I saw Iowans getting stuck in our system, getting shuffled around and sometimes really poor outcomes.’

Reynolds and her department heads also pointed agencies as a ‘one-stop shop’ for services, where before Iowans might have had to visit multiple agencies for one issue.

What are the Concerns?

Democratic lawmakers expressed concern that a smaller number of political appointees now have greater power, with more breadth and depth to their agencies.

‘There isn’t a person in this room who doesn’t want a responsive, streamlined government,’ said state Sen. Pam Jochum, who is now the leader of the Democratic caucus, during debate. ‘In my humble opinion, what we are putting at risk is oversight and accountability. What I believe is happening is a government that will be less responsive to everyday Iowans.’

Some pointed out that critical human rights functions, like the civil rights commission and the departments devoted to resources for blind and deaf Iowans, are now buried in other agencies, which could give their directors less authority to advocate for Iowans who need those services.

The director of the Department of Corrections, as compared with members of a localized board, now has authority over the operations that serve more than 30,000 individuals. Across the state, community and county leaders had questioned how effective the program will be when they lack control over their own services.

The law also gives the state’s attorney general more authority, specifying that departments cannot seek outside legal counsel and that the attorney general can prosecute any case on behalf of the state, even if a county attorney doesn’t request such an intervention. In particular, the law asserts that the attorney general alone should investigate allegations of election misconduct.

Who is Affected?

All Iowans are likely affected in some way by the state government reorganization, shifting where they go or who they contact for the services they need.

More than 2,600 state employees transitioned to a new department as part of the reorganization, Reynolds said Tuesday. She reported that the department heads have regularly communicated with employees to ensure a smooth transition, and many have had or will have the opportunity to advance and take on new responsibilities.

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Republican Arkansas Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders slammed left-wing activists for trying to cancel country music star Jason Aldean’s latest anti-crime music video, pointing out what she views as hypocrisy on public safety.

Aldean recently released a video for ‘Try That In a Small Town’ that included actual news clips of riots and looting in 2020. After activists claimed it was ‘racist and violent’ for Aldean to suggest lawlessness would not be tolerated in a small town, CMT pulled the music video from circulation.

‘The Left is now more concerned about @Jason_Aldean’s song calling out looters and criminals than they are about stopping looters and criminals,’ Sanders wrote Wednesday in a Twitter post.

Sanders said it represented Democrats’ ‘priorities’ for being outraged over Aldean’s lyrics while rising crime affects cities nationwide.

‘That tells you everything you need to know about the priorities of Democrats and woke companies like CMT that cave to the liberal mob,’ the Republican governor wrote on Twitter.

Sanders wasn’t the only politician to defend the singer. Presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy said the song was ‘sacrificed at the altar of censorship & cancellation.’

‘Jason Aldean writes a song defending the values that ALL Americans used to share — faith, family, hard work, patriotism — only to be immediately sacrificed at the altar of censorship & cancellation,’ Ramaswamy wrote. ‘These are the same people who cheer songs like ‘Cop Killer’ & the glorification of sex and violence in hip-hop. Stand strong against these hypocrites and opportunist frauds, @Jason_Aldean.’

Aldean hit back at critics, claiming that ‘these references are not only meritless, but dangerous.’

‘In the past 24 hours I have been accused of releasing a pro-lynching song (a song that has been out since May) and was subject to the comparison that I (direct quote) was not too pleased with the nationwide BLM protests,’ Aldean posted on social media.

Aldean also clarified that ‘there is not a single lyric in the song that references race or points to it — and there isn’t a single video clip that isn’t real news footage.’

Despite the backlash, Aldean’s hit reached No. 1 on iTunes on Wednesday.

Fox News’ Aubrie Spady contributed to this report.

North Carolina state Rep. Ben Moss won’t run for labor commissioner next year after all, saying on Wednesday that he’ll seek reelection to the General Assembly instead.

Moss, a Republican from Richmond County, announced his bid for commissioner last December. But he’s withdrawing, saying his time now ‘is best spent focusing on being present with my family and continuing my service’ to House district constituents. Moss is in his second two-year term in the House.

Announced candidates for commissioner include six-term state Rep. Jon Hardister, a Guilford County Republican and the majority whip, and Charlotte city council member and mayor pro-tem Braxton Winston, a Democrat.

Current GOP Commissioner Josh Dobson announced last year that he wouldn’t seek a second four-year term. Formal candidate filing begins this coming December, with any primaries scheduled for March 2024.

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Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., caused a stir when she held up several graphic photos from Hunter Biden’s laptop during a committee hearing Wednesday with IRS whistleblowers alleging misconduct in investigations into the Biden family.

The House Oversight Committee interviewed two IRS whistleblowers alleging political misconduct throughout the Hunter Biden investigation — Special Agent Joseph Ziegler, whose identity was revealed during the hearing, and his IRS supervisor Gary Shapley.

Shapley previously blew the whistle on alleged political influence surrounding prosecutorial decisions throughout the years-long federal probe into President Biden’s son.

Ziegler testified Wednesday that Hunter Biden itemized a $10,000 deduction on his 2018 tax return for a supposed golf club membership that was really a sex club membership and that he wrote off payments to prostitutes as business expenses.

‘So, I can tell you that there were deductions for what we believe to be escorts. And then that $10,000 golf club membership. Yes, that was not a golf club membership, that was for a sex club payment,’ Ziegler told Greene.

Greene held up censored nude photos taken from Hunter Biden’s abandoned laptop and addressed Ziegler. 

‘So, when Hunter Biden paid for this woman to do this with him, to travel across state lines from California to Washington, D.C., on June 15, this is a violation of the Mann Act. This was prostitution,’ Greene said.

‘This is evidence of Hunter Biden making sex — excuse me, this is my time – making pornography,’ she said holding up another photo, as Democrats objected.

One member interjected that showing the pictures was ‘unbecoming of this hearing,’ and another asked, ‘Should we be displaying this … in the committee?’

Greene’s time ran out after she was interrupted.

Ziegler, who identified himself as a gay Democrat with more than a dozen years serving within the IRS’ criminal investigative division, appeared for the first time publicly Wednesday, while Shapley testified to the House Ways and Means Committee last month.

The whistleblowers allege that officials at the Justice Department, FBI and IRS interfered in the investigation into Hunter Biden and that decisions in the case were influenced by politics.

Democratic presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. repudiated accusations that he peddled a racist and antisemitic conspiracy theory about COVID-19 during a New York City dinner last week. 

In an interview with Jewish News Syndicate published Monday, Kennedy expressed regret that his controversial remarks about COVID-19 were picked up by The New York Post during what he thought was an off-the-record dinner. The Post first reported video showing Kennedy discussing an argument that the coronavirus is ‘ethnically targeted’ to ‘attack Caucasians and black people’ while sparing ‘Ashkenazi Jews and Chinese.’ His comments created an uproar and were condemned by Jewish groups, the White House and even members of the Kennedy family. 

‘I made a statement in a meeting that was presented to us as Chatham House rules, as a closed meeting,’ Kennedy told JNS. ‘I made an accurate statement about an NIH-funded study. I regret ever talking about that now because it’s clear that even accurate facts will be distorted and misconstrued in ways that hurt people.’

‘The last thing I want to do is be hurtful to people, particularly Jewish people, who have already suffered more than any other race,’ he added.

In the lengthy interview, Kennedy was emphatic that he is not an antisemite. 

‘The worst two accusations that anybody can make about you are that you’re an antisemite or a pedophile,’ he said. ‘I don’t think there’s anything worse.’  

Kennedy told the outlet that an affection and affinity for Israel is ‘part of the DNA of our family,’ pointing to his uncle, President John F. Kennedy, and father, Robert F. Kennedy, a former U.S. attorney general and senator, who strongly supported Israel.

Kennedy pledged to continue that legacy if elected president and said, ‘It’s been a great disappointment and troubling development to me that the Democratic Party has drifted away from its traditions.’

He also said that moving forward, he will be more cautious before speaking in public. 

‘It’s clear to me now that I need to be much more careful,’ Kennedy told JNS.

‘I have to learn a lesson from this, and the lesson I learn is that I have to understand that the words that I use have impact, and they can be misused and misinterpreted,’ he said. ‘I regret talking about that study, and I am going to be careful to make sure that I don’t do anything like that in the future.’

Kennedy’s controversial remarks included the Democratic presidential candidate saying he did not know whether the virus was ‘deliberately targeted or not,’ but that there were ‘papers out there that show the racial or ethnic differential and impact’ on different groups.

‘There is an argument that it is ethnically targeted. COVID-19 attacks certain races disproportionately,’ he said. ‘COVID-19 is targeted to attack Caucasians and Black people. The people who are most immune are Ashkenazi Jews and Chinese.’

According to the Post, Kennedy also claimed the Chinese ‘are spending hundreds of millions of dollars developing ethnic bioweapons,’ and that the U.S. was also ‘developing ethnic bioweapons.’

White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre ripped his comments as ‘false,’ ‘vile’ and said they ‘put our fellow Americans in danger.’ Kennedy’s nephew, former Rep. Joe Kennedy III, said his uncle’s comments were ‘hurtful and wrong,’ while his sister Kerry Kennedy condemned them as ‘deplorable and untruthful.’ 

After the Post story broke, Kennedy attempted to clarify his remarks on social media, calling the Post’s story ‘mistaken’ and linking a study detailing the different effects COVID-19 had on people of different races to support his claims.

‘I accurately pointed out — during an off-the-record conversation — that the U.S. and other governments are developing ethnically targeted bioweapons and that a 2021 study of the COVID-19 virus shows that COVID-19 appears to disproportionately affect certain races since the furin cleave docking site is most compatible with Blacks and Caucasians and least compatible with ethnic Chinese, Finns and Ashkenazi Jews,’ he said. 

Kennedy also responded to his family, telling Fox News Digital, ‘The reactions of these family members are based on the New York Post’s misreporting and willful mischaracterization of what I said. This is an example of how the media manipulates Americans into turning against one another. Fortunately, I am sure that the love within our family will prevail over these attempts to divide us. May the same be true for the country.’ 

Kennedy described his long-shot bid for the Democratic nomination as a ‘mass experiment in truth-telling’ and told JNS he will attempt to maintain his personal integrity and a ‘clear conscience’ on the campaign trail. 

‘Ultimately, the success of this venture is in God’s hands, and the only thing I have control over is the little piece of real estate inside of my own shoes,’ he said. ‘My biggest objective is to end this process with my integrity intact. My second objective is to get elected president of the United States.’

Fox News’ Brandon Gillespie and Kathleen Joyce contributed to this report. 

White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre condemned Texas Gov. Greg Abbott for installing razor wire barriers in the Rio Grande to block migrants from crossing the U.S.-Mexico border.

Jean-Pierre made the comments during a White House press briefing on Wednesday, saying Abbott’s decision was ‘atrocious’ and ‘inhumane.’ The White House official stopped short of saying whether President Biden had discussed the issue with the Mexican government.

‘Texas has been installing these buoys along with razor wire on the Rio Grande near Eagle Pass. Mexico is now requesting that Texas remove these barriers. They say the state is violating international treaties and that they raised this with the administration three weeks ago. Do you agree with Mexico that Texas is violating these international treaties?’ a reporter asked.

‘This governor … has treated the situation that we’re seeing at the border in an inhumane way,’ Jean-Pierre responded. ‘It is atrocious, the actions that he decides to take. He takes this [action] instead of dealing with this issue in a way that we can get to a resolution and working together, he turns it into a political stunt.’

CHINA SEEKS TO GAIN ‘FOOTHOLD’ ON AMERICA’S DOORSTEP AMID BORDER CRISIS, TOP REPUBLICAN WARNS 

‘I can’t speak to conversations three weeks ago with the Mexican government,’ she added. ‘I don’t have any information to share if that came up in a conversation.’

Mexico sent a diplomatic note to the U.S. government earlier this week saying that Texas’ deployment of floating barriers along the Rio Grande may violate treaties on boundaries and water.

Texas began rolling out the new floating barriers in early July, but migrant advocates have voiced concerns about drowning risks from the buoys. Environmentalists also questioned the impact on the river.

Abbott’s office has defended the inflatable barriers, arguing they will ‘proactively prevent illegal crossings between ports of entry by making it more difficult to cross the Rio Grande and reach the Texas side of the southern border.’

‘Texas has pushed back against the swell of migrants and held the line to keep people out of Texas — but there’s more that needs to be done,’ Abbott said last month. ‘The Texas Legislature has stepped up to make sure we continue to robustly respond to President Biden’s growing border crisis, including allocating $5.1 billion for border security.’

Fox News’ Greg Norman contributed to this report.

With hundreds of migrants arriving daily, New York City will start giving adult asylum seekers in the city’s shelter system 60 days notice to find somewhere else to live, Mayor Eric Adams said Wednesday.

The new policy is intended to make room for migrant families with children, Adams said. Caseworkers will help migrants who are asked to vacate find housing and other services, he said, and those who don’t find alternative housing within 60 days will have to return to the intake center and reapply for a new placement.

‘We must now take additional steps to create urgently needed space for families with children who continue to arrive seeking asylum and help those with us take the next steps to their journey,’ Adams said at a City Hall news conference. He added, ‘Our goal is no child, no family sleeping on the streets.’

Adams, a Democrat, has scrambled to house the tens of thousands of migrants who have arrived in the city over the past year and has called for more help from the state and federal governments.

The city has rented out entire hotels to house migrants and has also put cots in schools and temporarily housed people in tents, a cruise ship terminal and a former police academy building.

Adams said more than 54,800 migrants are currently in the city’s care, with 300 to 500 more arriving daily. ‘This cannot continue,’ Adams said. ‘It’s not sustainable and we’re not going to pretend as though it is sustainable.’

Under the new policy, Deputy Mayor for Health and Human Services Anne Williams-Isom said adult asylum seekers who have been in the city’s shelter system for a significant amount of time will receive their 60-day notice on a rolling basis.

‘As we continue to tackle this humanitarian crisis, we must devise novel ways of moving people within and through our system to find where they will ultimately settle,’ Williams-Isom said.

But immigration advocates said the new plan would create bureaucratic hurdles for vulnerable migrants and would violate the 1981 court order that requires the city to provide temporary housing for every homeless person who asks for it.

‘This is a bad policy that will be directly responsible for leaving families homeless and living on the streets,’ Murad Awawdeh, executive director of the New York Immigration Coalition, said in a statement. ‘The new rule is an abhorrent end run on our right to shelter laws, and does not reflect the welcoming values of New York City.’

Adams said he was not going to be deterred by potential legal challenges to the new policy.

‘The court system is going to do what the court system is going to do,’ he said.

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An IRS whistleblower who came forward to testify before Congress on Wednesday confirmed claims by House Republicans that Hunter Biden and his companies raked in over $17 million from foreign sources over several years, beginning while his father was vice president.

The House Oversight Committee interviewed two IRS whistleblowers alleging political misconduct throughout the Hunter Biden investigation: special agent Joseph Ziegler, whose identity was revealed during the hearing, and his IRS supervisor Gary Shapley, who previously blew the whistle on alleged political influence surrounding prosecutorial decisions throughout the years-long federal probe into the president’s son.

Ziegler told Committee Chairman James Comer, R-Ky., that Hunter Biden, his family members and business associates received over $17 million due to business dealings in China, Ukraine and Romania.

Those deals included multimillion-dollar payments to Biden family-linked companies from 2014 to 2019, including $7.3 million from Ukrainian energy company Burisma Holdings.

‘This brings the total amount of foreign income streams received to approximately $17 million, correct?’ Comer asked Ziegler.

‘That is correct,’ Ziegler responded.

‘The purpose of documenting the foreign sources is part of a normal international tax investigation,’ Ziegler said. ‘We have to figure out where the money is coming from.’

Comer argued the foreign payments demonstrate an ‘influence-peddling scheme to enrich the Bidens.’

‘Despite creating many companies after vice president took office, the Biden family used associates companies to receive millions of dollars from foreign companies in China, Ukraine and Romania after foreign companies sent money to business associates companies,’ the chairman said. ‘The Bidens then received incremental payments over time to various different bank accounts. These complicated financial transactions were used deliberately to conceal the source of funds and total amounts. No normal business operates like this.’

Ziegler, who identified himself as a gay Democrat with more than a dozen years serving within the IRS’ criminal investigative division, appeared for the first time publicly Wednesday, while Shapley testified last month.

The whistleblowers allege that officials at the Justice Department, FBI and IRS interfered in the investigation into Hunter Biden, and that decisions in the case were influenced by politics.