NYPD bus illegal immigrant squatters away from NYC hotel, ending standoff

According to NBC 4, police told the illegal immigrants that they needed to leave, with around 30 migrants being bused away from the Manhattan hotel. City sanitation workers came shortly after the area was vacated to clean up the sidewalk.

26-year-old Venezuelan immigrant Jefferson Gonzalez told the Daily Mail, "I am very ashamed and embarrassed because we are not in a position to demand. They make us all Venezuelans look bad and we are not all the same."

"Since some of us don’t have work. We are here for now, but we do not have options," Gonzalez said. "Tomorrow when we want to get ahead and get a job it could be difficult because these people left us in a bad position in front of the whole world."

Most of the illegal immigrants outside of the hotel were bused to an immigrant housing facility in Brooklyn. Mayor Eric Adams, who has said his city has proven too crime-ridden even for illegal immigrants, transformed a cruise terminal in Brooklyn into a shelter that could house 1,000 immigrants.

Another Venezuela immigrant, 22-year-old Llabrado, told the Daily Mail "jail is better" than the Brooklyn site.

"I can't live here. It's not like I can't, I don't want to. It's not conditions for a normal person," he added.

The standoff began Monday night as more than 50 immigrants gathered outside the hotel along with activists who were handing out water and food, demanding that they be able to remain at the hotel. The standoff had lasted for days, with City Hall saying the activist group South Bronx Mutual Aid was leading the cause.

Mayoral press secretary Fabien Levy said before the standoff's end, "instead of encouraging asylum seekers to sleep in warm, indoor, temperature-controlled quarters at the Brooklyn Cruise Terminal, these groups are telling migrants to sleep in tents on the streets."

Earlier in the week the protests had turned violent with one illegal immigrant allegedly smashing a camera from a Dubai-based Al Arabiya TV reporter.