Arizona’s Democratic Governor, Katie Hobbs, has revealed her intentions to continue the program her Republican predecessor started by bussing migrants out of the state. Yet, she insists her way will be more humane and efficient.
Speaking to the Arizona Sun, Hobbs defended her decision to keep the Republican policy in place. She explained that her administration would focus on ensuring the state’s cost to bus migrants was “humane and efficient.”
Hobbs recalled discussing the decision to uphold her predecessors’, former Arizona Governor Doug Ducey’s (R), the policy during her campaign.
Yet she emphasized her implementation would ensure the taxpayer-funded program was more efficient and not a “political stunt.”
Ducey began bussing migrants out of Arizona in May 2022, later having the program expanded to include the option to charter a 737 aircraft, or at least the option to charter one.
Hobbs’ plan includes chartering a 737 aircraft, according to a government contract the state signed on January 14, 2023.
Over the course of the program’s time under Ducey’s leadership, Arizona spent roughly $82,000 a bus trip bussing 3,000 migrants out of the state and to Washington, D.C.
Newly sworn-in Hobbs plans to decrease the cost per trip while connecting the migrants to their U.S.-based on the trip.
The Arizona Governor noted that if the money was being spent on transporting migrants, they might as well be taken to their final destination.
Hobbs insisted that this distinction made her move to maintain the policy differences, as it didn’t only focus on dropping migrants in Democrat-led cities.
