New York City is a sanctuary city. Progressives there are proud of this stance. However, thanks to Texas Governor Greg Abbot and Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, they are finding out exactly what “sanctuary city” means. It’s ugly, and it impacts the poorest sections of NYC the most.

Perhaps the borough hardest hit by the migrant crisis is Queens, which accounts for a hefty 70 of the 193 shelters in NYC. In a single zip code, 11101 — Long Island City and Astoria — there are 24 migrant shelters. Many of those shelters are, by design, close to housing projects. This has caused not only an influx of crime but migrants’ bikes and scooters clutter the sidewalks. Migrants are also competing for resources that the poverty-stricken New York residents depend on like food banks and other nonprofits.

Locals are not happy about it. One of them told the New York Post, “The city dropped a bomb on us. The [migrants] are taking over. They’re taking over all the parking with their 8,000 scooters. They’re disrespectful — peeing in front of everybody. We do that one time, and we’re going to jail for a long time.”

So, not only are the residents competing for resources, but they are also experiencing firsthand the Biden brand of two-tiered justice.

City Councilman Robert Holden bemoaned the state of his borough, saying, “We’re getting dumped on here. How long can we sustain this? These shelters add nothing to the neighborhood. They only bring crime.”

The residents are exasperated that they are bearing the brunt of the crisis while Park Avenue and other more affluent parts of town get to pretend the crisis isn’t happening. The elites on the Upper East Side only have one migrant shelter in their whole string of zip codes. They are louder and wealthier and so empathetic (humph) that they are happy to be a sanctuary for the migrants … far away from their own bubbles.

To be clear, the migrants are making their presence known all over NYC. There are literal gangs of scooter-riding miscreants robbing New Yorkers with impunity. However, Queens, where the migrant shelters are the thickest and the average income is just over $37,000, seems to be specifically targeted.

It’s not just New York, either. In Chicago, the poor and homeless have been sidelined in an effort to care for the influx of migrants. Mayor Brandon Johnson has been ignoring the ever-growing discontent of his residents, who are fed up with the city’s willingness to ignore its own citizens in favor of illegal immigrants.

These leftist cities are making their poorest residents even poorer. So much for all their “sanctuary city” mumbo jumbo. They are empathetic only if you’re not American and only if you’re far away from their ivory towers.