16th bus of migrants from Texas arrives in Los Angeles

Another bus carrying migrants from Texas arrived in downtown Los Angeles Monday, the 16th such arrival since June.

“One bus with migrants on board from Texas arrived around 2 p.m. today at Union Station,” Zach Seidl, deputy mayor of communications for Mayor Karen Bass, said in a statement. “This is the sixteenth bus that has arrived. The city has continued to work with city departments, the county, and a coalition of nonprofit organizations, in addition to our faith partners, to execute a plan set in place earlier this year. As we have before, when we became aware of the bus yesterday, we activated our plan.”

On X, formerly known as Twitter, the Coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights confirmed the arrival of the bus with 38 asylum seekers from Texas. The group includes 23 adults and 15 children from Colombia, Ecuador, Honduras and Venezuela.

CHIRLA noted “some have not eaten in days.”

CHIRLA is a member of the LA Welcomes Collective, a network of nonprofit, faith groups and city and county services that respond to the arrival of migrant buses.

“Asylum-seekers are human beings who have undergone traumatic experiences in their country of origin and while en route to the safe haven they call USA. They are in distress and need our support,” CHIRLA said in a statement. “As a nation, we have been kind to strangers and we will do it again.”

The LA Welcomes Collective, the city and county of Los Angeles responded to the arrival of migrants last week, as well.

Texas Gov. Greg Abbott has been orchestrating the trips under Operation Lone Star, saying Texas’ border region is “overwhelmed” by immigrants crossing the Mexican border. OLS is a joint operation between the Texas Department of Public Safety and the Texas Military Department along the southern border between Texas and Mexico.

Abbott added, “Texas secures the border in Pres. (Joe) Biden’s absence.”

“Texas’ small border towns remain overwhelmed and overrun by the thousands of people illegally crossing into Texas from Mexico because of President Biden’s refusal to secure the border,” Abbott said in a statement after the first bus arrived in Los Angeles in June.

“Los Angeles is a major city that migrants seek to go to, particularly now that its city leaders approved its self-declared sanctuary city status. Our border communities are on the front lines of President Biden’s border crisis, and Texas will continue providing this much-needed relief until he steps up to do his job and secure the border,” he added.

Mayor Karen Bass has complained that Abbott’s office does not share enough information with Los Angeles about the shipments. She told KNX that if Abbott’s concerns and actions were legitimate and sincere, then “someone in the government and Texas would notify us and coordinate with us.”

“We hear about the buses headed our way when they’re on the way. We have no idea who’s going to be on the bus, how many people it is or what condition they’re going to be in when they get here,” she said. “Sometimes they haven’t had any food, barely had enough water.”

The Los Angeles City Council approved a motion on June 9 seeking to formally establish the city as a sanctuary city.

Last month, the council approved a motion calling for the City Attorney’s Office to investigate whether crimes were committed on or before June 14, when Abbott sent 42 migrants to Los Angeles in the first of the shipments.