The more Chicago learns about costs for accommodating illegal immigrants, the worse it gets
Back in 2023, when the migrant "crisis" was washing over Chicago, Brandon Johnson rolled into City Hall to kick off an avalanche of spending on "newcomers," but now a state review has found that he paid millions to contractors who provided no actual work for the illegals they were hired to care for.
The first busloads of illegal migrants first started pulling into Chicago about nine months before Johnson took office, of course, but he ran on a pledge to help these new "neighbors" flooding into the Windy City. Johnson campaigned specifically on plans to provide food, clothing, healthcare, housing, and support for the illegals entering the city. He professed his deep belief in the city's sanctuary status, and denigrated law enforcement for being too harsh on illegals. Perhaps more shocking, he even wanted to give illegals the right to vote in certain instances!
But it was the boatloads of cash that Johnson began throwing at the problem that is most notable. The mayor has spent more than $639.6 million on illegals since he came to office three years ago, WLS-TV reported last year. And apparently there was a lot of graft and waste in this huge expenditure.
Now, the Democrat-run state of Illinois even found some massive waste in Chicago's spending on illegals.
The state audit found that the support systems for the growing number of city shelters for illegals consumed tens of millions of tax dollars. But some of the companies that Johnson's administration paid off racked up millions for no work at all.
For instance, the city hired Kansas-based company Favorite HealthCare Staffing to provide relief workers for the shelters, doling out at least $78 million to this company to care for the illegals in the city's shelters. But what services did this company provide? The state found that the company's "relief workers" got paid to do nothing at all.
According to WMAQ-TV:
"Favorite invoices for a four-week period covered 400 of their relief employees who billed the city for 84 hours of work each, per week. That billing included regular pay rates of $50 to $156 per hour, and up to $234 an hour for overtime.
Shelter housekeepers were paid $17,000 per week, or the equivalent of more than $220,000 per year.
Each security guard was billed at a rate of $312,000 per year, and the report showed one contract nurse was given the equivalent of $836,000 in annual pay."
The state's Auditor General report recommended officials keep closer tabs on the hours these companies bill. The report also urged the Illinois Emergency Mmanagement and Homeland Security agencies to review contractor invoices before doling out tax dollars. You know, like a real business would do.
This is just one example of the wasteful spending that Johnson indulged for the migrant crisis. But who can doubt that a closer look at Johnson's expenditures on illegals will reveal so much more waste than this?
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