The Daily Satire: Is it time to close the East Coast?
A little satire for the heck of it ... We're turning the tables on New York ... More legal battles over homelessness.
The center of the immigration debate shifted from the U.S.-Mexico border to cities like New York over the past few months. As we read news stories from New York, it occurred to us that we had a unique opportunity.
After decades of reporters from the East Coast writing about border states as if they were some exotic locale, why not turn it around and write about New York the way they often write about us?
You know, leaning hard on Wild West theatricality and ignoring how most of us actually live. Having a cactus or a border fence in the background of every shot and constantly saying how “dusty” Arizona is. Always interviewing the same few ranchers for every story. Not understanding that things happen differently depending on where you are on the border. That kind of stuff.
So in that spirit, we used every cliche we could think of as a satire of news coverage of asylum seekers in New York.
From the swampy shores of Lake Okeechobee in Florida to the bustling streets of Manhattan, East Coast officials are calling on the federal government to do something about a recent influx of asylum seekers.
New York, a port city about 200 miles from the nation’s capital, has seen its share of immigrants over the years. In fact, it’s hard to walk a block without coming across a restaurant selling pizza, a staple of the city’s diet that was introduced by Italian immigrants. There’s even a statue in the harbor dedicated to immigrants who arrived by boat a century ago.
But lately, the city that never sleeps is having nightmares about the arrival of thousands of asylum seekers, mostly from Central and South American countries.
New York residents, or New Yorkers as they call themselves, lead fast-paced lives, as we’ve seen in countless television shows and movies. We caught up with a few of them to get their thoughts on the situation.
“I mean, I guess it’s no big deal, right?” said Carrie, a single woman searching for love on the Upper West Side. “Maybe the city has to let go of what it is, so it can become what it will be.”
For Sipowicz, a hard-boiled detective trying to do some good in a city that doesn’t seem to care, the situation came down to one thing.
“As long as they stay on the right side of the law, it don’t matter to me,” he said.
We managed to get in a few questions with Gordon, an investment banker sporting slicked-back hair and a $5,000 suit, as he got out of his stretch limo.
“Look, I don’t have time for this, OK? But I get it. They’re looking to make a buck. Who wouldn’t want to come to New York?” he said.
Some New Yorkers are wondering if the city will suddenly start seeing break-ins and theft, now that people from other countries are arriving. The city always looks safe in the romantic comedies we watch, so it seemed unnecessary to look up crime statistics.
Still, we needed to connect asylum seekers to crime in New York somehow, so we went to Downsville, a small town nestled in a pine forest about 130 miles away.
“You see it every day. I mean, you can’t turn on the TV without hearing about murders and whatnot in the city,” said Darrell, a bearded, burly man with a chiseled jawline who wore a red-and-black flannel shirt and a gray, wool beanie.
The influx of asylum seekers to New York comes as the city has struggled to deal with cocaine smugglers who’ve controlled the East Coast for decades. Since President Joe Biden took office, East Coast border officers have seized 131,000 pounds of cocaine. (This is actually true).
Most of that cocaine was seized in Florida and Puerto Rico, so we sent a camera crew to rural New Hampshire. So far, all we’ve gotten are confused looks from local residents. But we’ll report back with something. Anything will do, really.
With so many public safety questions swirling, some say it’s time to close the East Coast. A nationwide poll showed 83% of Midwesterners think the Biden administration should shut down the East Coast, including 42% who believe it’s “long overdue” or “somewhat overdue.”
“Shut it all down. Give us some breathing room and then we’ll re-open the East Coast once we’ve got control of it,” said Charles, a real estate agent in suburban Cincinnati.
Among East Coast residents, the most common response was a write-in answer to the poll with some variation of “What in the heck are you talking about? You can’t just shut it down. That’s impossible. The coastline is thousands of miles long.”
In the meantime, the governors of Nevada, Wisconsin, and Oregon issued a joint statement saying they were concerned about the situation in New York. They plan to send 4,000 National Guard troops to watch the North Carolina coastline.
Clues from space: The University of Arizona-led $1.1 billion OSIRIS-REx space mission touched down Sunday in Utah, delivering a capsule filled with rocks and dust from the asteroid Bennu, the Arizona Daily Star’s Henry Brean reports. Researchers say the science canister’s materials could offer clues about the origins of the solar system and life on Earth. The recovery team flew in helicopters to the landing site to retrieve the capsule, taking it to a sterile, clean room at a secure military facility west of Salt Lake City.
Analyze this: Tucson is one of 10 cities selected to receive a no-cost analytical tool to better understand the local real estate market and assist its Housing and Development Department in preserving and creating affordable housing, KVOA’s Myles Standish writes. The resources will help support Tucson’s Housing Affordability Strategy by helping to track and maintain existing public housing assets that the city owns and operates.
Dying in the desert: An infant girl found with her mother in the desert area near the Mariposa border crossing died Saturday at the Border Patrol station in Nogales, the Tucson Sentinel’s Paul Ingram writes. A U.S. Customs and Border Protection spokesman said a contracted medical provider and emergency medical technician tried to resuscitate the girl, who was not breathing. She was later declared dead at a nearby hospital, but the cause of death is currently unclear.
Setting records: Migrant apprehensions in the Border Patrol’s Tucson Sector reached a 16-year high in August, with the sector continuing to be the busiest in the nation, Arizona Public Media’s Danyelle Khmara reports. Agents apprehended migrants nearly 49,000 times in August, up 24% from July. More than half of the migrants were part of a family and most turned themselves in, hoping to make an asylum claim.
Road rage: Santa Cruz County Supervisor Bruce Bracker is holding an open house meeting tonight in Patagonia about permitting for the controversial “Cross Creek Connector,” the Patagonia Regional Times’ Jay Babcock and Marion Vendituoli write. The connector is a 1.2-mile rural road being constructed by South32, that will be used to move construction materials to its Hermosa Project site and provide a temporary route in the early years of production. A traffic impact study released in May alarmed some members of Patagonia’s town council, given the high volume of traffic anticipated on the road.
No camping allowed: Republican legislators have filed a legal brief to protect state lawmakers’ ability to pass laws clearing homeless encampments and ticket people living on the street, Capitol Media Services’ Howard Fischer reports. The private attorney hired by House Speaker Ben Toma and Senate President Warren Petersen argues in the brief that unless U.S. Supreme Court justices overturn a lower court ruling, states won’t be able to enact laws that they say keep residents safe while also protecting homeless people from the risks of illegal encampments.
78.5 million: The number of people living in U.S. states that border Mexico.
In their defense, isn't it kinda hard to not have a cactus in the background of every shot? :p
Lol 😂
“The city always looks safe in the romantic comedies we watch, so it seemed unnecessary to look up crime statistics.”