Republican Representative Lauren Boebert is railing against a new Colorado initiative that will allow all state residents to call into a hotline if they want to be a host for a migrant family.
Local Denver television station KDVR has reported that just since late last year, the non-profit group known as Hope Has No Borders has successfully paired at least 500 migrants with different host families throughout the state.
Starting on May 1, any person in Colorado who wanted to sign up for the group’s Home Host program only had to call the help center for Mile High United Way by dialing 211. After the help center receives the requests, they pass that information onto Hope Has No Borders, which then matches migrant families with hosts who want to help.
While many people have celebrated the program, Boebert — a firebrand conservative from Colorado — has called it “the most asinine and ridiculous thing I’ve ever heard.”
As she wrote on the social media platform X:
“Denver has now opened a hotline for residents to call and offer up their own homes to illegals. If you have extra space, you’re encouraged to host a ‘migrant’ for some time.. …
“We need to close the damn border and have some semblance of a sovereign nation again. The entire world sees this stuff and thinks we’re a joke of a nation … and we’re really beginning to look like one!”
These comments haven’t stopped some people from wanting to help, and believing that the program is good. Erin Lennon, for instance, told KMGH — another local TV station in Denver — that she hosted a migrant family last year because she felt compelled to help out.
Lennon hosted a family of four people who recently came to the region after trekking two months from Chile. She commented:
“They’re extremely hard workers. They want to succeed. They want to have a chance.”
According to a spokesperson for Hope Has No Borders, the group’s mission “is to provide humanitarian relief and community support to individuals as they transition from crisis to HOPE.”
The spokesperson continued:
“HOPE’s Host Home Program is one of a wide range of solutions needed to address socio-economic disparities. Our program is designed to include hosts with a willingness to open their homes to a broad range of people in need of transitional housing including veterans, those experiencing poverty, or those who have been displaced due to a natural disaster.”
The program doesn’t receive any funding from Mile High United Way, the spokesperson said, as it’s completely run by Hope Has No Borders.
Illegal immigration has been a major problem throughout the country, especially in liberal-led cities such as Denver. Since the end of 2022, the city has spent nearly $70 million for services for the more than 41,000 immigrants who have arrived there.
One new program that Denver Mayor Mike Johnston just announced recently will place about 1,000 asylum seekers who have been living in the hotel shelter system over to apartments for as much as six months.
