Migrants Set Up Tents Outside of Manhattan Hotel to Protest Relocation

A group of asylum seekers set up camp outside a hotel in midtown Manhattan to push back against the city’s attempt to relocate them to a shelter in Brooklyn on Monday, January 30, according to local news reports.

Earlier this month, New York Mayor Eric Adams announced his plan to move single men from the Watson Hotel to a new shelter at the Brooklyn Cruise Terminal, which can house 1,000 people.

According to local news reports, single adult men staying at the Watson are being moved to make space for migrant families with children.

A representative of Make the Road NY, an organization that says it advocates for immigrants and “working-class people of color” in New York state, said they "condemn the City’s action to force asylum-seekers to move to the Brooklyn Cruise Terminal.

“The city must treat recently arrived people as just that – people, who need stability to have a functional day-to-day life, not puzzle pieces to be moved around arbitrarily,” the statement said.

Footage posted to Twitter by journalist Jericho Tran shows tents and signs set up near the hotel. Tran said one migrant told her he would rather sleep on the ground than face the poor shelter conditions.

Local news reported that police told migrants they could not block the sidewalk and made them take down their tents. Credit: @reportingwithjericho via Storyful

Video Transcript

[CHATTER]