By Anthony Izaguirre
New York City is challenging a unique legal agreement that requires it to provide emergency housing to anyone who asks for it, as the city's shelter system strains under a large influx of international migrants who have arrived since last year.
The city filed a request late Tuesday asking a court to allow it to suspend the requirement when there is a state of emergency where the shelter population of single adults increases at a rapid rate.
The filing came as Mayor Eric Adams embarks on a four-day trip through Latin America, starting Wednesday in Mexico, where he said he will discourage people from coming to New York, telling them the city's shelter system is at capacity and its resources are overwhelmed.
The city has been moving to suspend the so called right to shelter for months under the surge of migrants, arguing the requirement was never intended to be applied to a humanitarian crisis such as the latest influx.
The shelter requirement has been in place for more than four decades in New York City, following a legal agreement struck in 1981 that required the city to provide temporary housing for every homeless person. No other big city in America has such a requirement.
“With more than 122,700 asylum seekers having come through our intake system since the spring of 2022, and projected costs of over $12 billion for three years, it is abundantly clear that the status quo cannot continue,” Adams, a Democrat, said in a statement. "New York City cannot continue to do this alone.”
Adams had heralded the shelter requirement at the start of the crisis as a display of the city's empathy toward asylum seekers. In the months since, his rhetoric has hardened as the city has spent more than a billion dollars to rent space in hotels, erect large emergency shelters and provide government services for migrants who arrive without housing or jobs.
“This issue will destroy New York City,” Adams said last month.
The mayor has also recently tightened New York shelter rules by limiting adult migrants to just 30 days in city-run facilities amid overcrowding.
Josh Goldfein, a staff attorney at The Legal Aid Society, said the city's request, if successful, would be disastrous for the city.
“What is the alternative? If we do not have a right to shelter, if we are turning people away from the shelter system, if people are now living in the streets, in the subways, in the parks, is that the outcome that they want?” he said. “That is something we have not seen in decades. I don't think any New Yorker wants to see that. I don't think city officials want to see that but that will be the result if they were to prevail here.”
President Donald Trump says “there seems to be no reason” to meet with Chinese leader Xi Jinping as part of an upcoming trip to South Korea after China restricted exports of rare earths needed for American industry. The Republican president suggested Friday he was looking at a “massive increase” of import taxes on Chinese products in response to Xi’s moves. Trump says one of the policies the U.S. is calculating is "a massive increase of Tariffs on Chinese products coming into the United States." A monthslong calm on Wall Street was shattered, with U.S. stocks falling on the news. The Chinese Embassy in Washington hasn't responded to an Associated Press request for comment.
Most members of the Federal Reserve’s interest-rate setting committee supported further reductions to its key interest rate this year, minutes from last month’s meeting showed.
From Wall Street trading floors to the Federal Reserve to economists sipping coffee in their home offices, the first Friday morning of the month typically brings a quiet hush around 8:30 a.m. eastern, as everyone awaits the Labor Department’s monthly jobs report.
The Supreme Court is allowing Lisa Cook to remain as a Federal Reserve governor for now.
Rep. John Moolenaar has requested an urgent briefing from the White House after Trump supported a deal giving Americans a majority stake in TikTok.
A new report finds the Department of Government Efficiency’s remaking of the federal workforce has battered the Washington job market and put more households in the metropolitan area in financial distress.
A new poll finds U.S. adults are more likely than they were a year ago to think immigrants in the country legally benefit the economy. That comes as President Donald Trump's administration imposes new restrictions targeting legal pathways into the country. The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research survey finds Americans are more likely than they were in March 2024 to say it’s a “major benefit” that people who come to the U.S. legally contribute to the economy and help American companies get the expertise of skilled workers. At the same time, perceptions of illegal immigration haven’t shifted meaningfully. Americans still see fewer benefits from people who come to the U.S. illegally.
Shares of Tylenol maker Kenvue are bouncing back sharply before the opening bell a day after President Donald Trump promoted unproven and in some cases discredited ties between Tylenol, vaccines and autism. Trump told pregnant women not to use the painkiller around a dozen times during the White House news conference Monday. The drugmaker tumbled 7.5%. Shares have regained most of those losses early Tuesday in premarket trading.
Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell on Tuesday signaled a cautious approach to future interest rate cuts, in sharp contrast with other Fed officials who have called for a more urgent approach. In remarks in Providence, Rhode Island, Powell noted that there are risks to both of the Fed’s goals of seeking maximum employment and stable prices. His approach is in sharp contrast to some members of the Fed’s rate-setting committee who are pushing for faster cuts.
President Donald Trump’s efforts to reshape the American media landscape have led to the suspension of late-night comedian Jimmy Kimmel.
