New York City Mayor Eric Adams is taking fire from immigration activists over what they say is a “racist” comment about migrants being suitable to fill a shortage of lifeguards as they are “excellent swimmers” — but the mayor’s office claims they are missing the point.
“New Yorkers are looking to Mayor Eric Adams to unite our City, not foment more division. His comments on asylum seekers being ‘excellent swimmers’ implies that because some immigrants had to swim or wade across water on their dangerous journeys to seek safety in the United States, that they would make good lifeguards,” Murad Awawdeh, President and CEO of the New York Immigration Coalition said in a statement.
“This comment is racist, and the Mayor should not be making light of the perilous and often life-threatening journeys people are forced to make to escape violence and persecution,” he added. “It’s demeaning and dehumanizing.”
‘EXCELLENT SWIMMERS’: DEM MAYOR FLOATS MIGRANTS AS SOLUTION FOR CITY’S LIFEGUARD SHORTAGE
Awawdeh was reacting to comments Adams made Tuesday when he was asked at a press conference about a lifeguard shortage in the city as Memorial Day approaches.
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New York City Mayor Eric Adams speaks to reporters on Oct. 12, 2023.(New York City )
He said the situation could be helped “If we had a migrant and asylum seeker plan that states those jobs that we are… in high demand we could expedite.”
“How do we have a large body of people that are in our city, and country, that are excellent swimmers and, at the same time, we need lifeguards — and the only obstacle is that we won’t give them the right to work to become a lifeguard,” he said.
“That just doesn’t make sense.”
He listed off other occupations, including food service workers and nurses, where the Big Apple could face shortages.
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Migrants camp out in front of the Watson Hotel after being evicted, on February 01, 2023 in New York City.(Leonardo Munoz/VIEWpres)
“We have all these eligible people waiting to work with the skills we need to fill the jobs, but we are unable to allow them to work because bureaucracy is in the way,” he said. “That just does not make sense.”
The comments drew surprise from conservatives as well as activists, with them viewing the comment as a gaffe. But Adams has repeatedly called for the expediting of work permits to allow those in the country claiming asylum to be able to work.
The mayor’s office pushed back against the criticism in a statement on Wednesday.
DEM MAYOR FACES BACKLASH FOR CITY’S ‘HAPHAZARD’ MIGRANT POLICY: ‘CRUELTY’
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“With more than 197,000 migrants who have come through our care since the spring of 2022, Mayor Adams has been clear that there is nothing more un-American than not allowing someone to work,” a city hall spokesperson said.
“The mayor has repeatedly pointed out that there are people in our shelter system right now who are qualified for vacant city jobs — in industries such as food service, construction, manufacturing, lifeguarding, and more — and yet, we cannot hire them because the federal government has not issued them work authorization and the right to work,” they said. “Anyone who is trying to make more out of the mayor continuing to make that point today is missing the forest for the trees.”
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His office also pointed to multiple instances this year where Adams has called for migrants to be given the ability to work — including as lifeguards.
“We need everything from lifeguards to workers in the racing industry to food service workers,” Adams said earlier this month on FOX5 “Good Day New York.” “It’s really ironic that when we need so many employees across the country, where states and cities are seeing a drop in population, I think that when people are paroled legally into the country, we should designate where they go based on the needs of the country and allow them to work there for three years, and then allow them to go anywhere in the country.”
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Adams has also called for a national resettlement strategy and additional funding from the federal government.
Get the latest updates on the ongoing border crisis from the Fox News Digital immigration hub.
Adam Shaw is a politics reporter for Fox News Digital, primarily covering immigration and border security.
He can be reached at adam.shaw2@fox.com or on Twitter.
BURLINGTON, Vt. — Shelley MacDonald and her husband, both Canadian citizens, had been living in Paris for over a decade when the pandemic hit. She’d been selling baked goods and hosting a dinner club called Paris Bread in their apartment. She wanted to open a business in the United States, where she could operate in English. It was time to leave, except that, at the moment, only American passport holders could fly into the United States.
With ingenuity and grit, the couple discovered a visa for foreign entrepreneurs and secured one from the American Embassy the day it reopened after lockdown. Once their passports were stamped, they had 30 days to fly out and move everything they owned to this picturesque college town.
Since 2022, MacDonald has run Belleville Bakery & Catering near City Hall in Burlington, Vt., down the street from the University of Vermont. She’s training staff, including students, and offering confections you might see in a Parisian patisserie, most not as fancy. She has different varieties of all-butter croissants, cinnamon snails and feta-garlic snails made with croissant trimmings, tempting lunch items such as bacon cheddar quiche and tuna sandwiches with smoked Gouda on homemade onions buns, and dinners such as lasagna, rigatoni, and chicken pot pie to take home.
Shelley MacDonald, a Canadian citizen, lived in Paris before moving to Burlington.Sheryl Julian
“I think the town is adorable with kind people who help you when you don’t need to be helped,” says MacDonald, sitting in the bright bakery. “There’s something very special about Vermont.”
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She and her husband — the hyperrealist painter André Beaulieu — picked Burlington because they had visited often when they lived in his hometown, Montreal. “The real reason is so that I could open a business in English,” she told her 48,000 Instagram followers, “so that I could function in my native language, for all of the reading and writing and dealing with lawyers and accountants and plumbers that you need to do when you own a business.”
MacDonald describes their new situation as “the best of both possible worlds, where I get to live in English in a really cute space, and he gets to live with me in English in a really cute space and he’s really close to home.” She describes her business as her “dream job.”
The 100-year-old building whose storefront she renovated is large and airy, with bakers in the kitchen in full view making croissant and brioche doughs, prepping cookie batters and galette pastry.
Quiches at Belleville Bakery.Sheryl Julian
MacDonald moves quickly, laughs easily, and greets customers warmly. “People come into a bakery looking for a treat and some kind of care,” she says. When you’ve finished eating, you don’t have to take your plates and cups to various bins for recycle and trash. That system horrifies her. “No bussing,” she says. “We take care of you.”
Her clientele skews older, she has noticed, and they’re looking for somewhere to go. “The demand is enormous,” she says. She describes her personality as “Shelley takes care of people.” Remembering her days running an underground restaurant, MacDonald now offers twice-monthly Sunday brunches and dinners, both served at a long table farmhouse-style so everyone talks to their neighbors.
MacDonald, who is willing to throw everything at the wall and see what sticks, also has a successful mail-order arm to send cookies across the country. They’re thick and perfectly round in flavors such as orange gingersnap, pistachio chocolate, and lemon pistachio shortbread.
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She also gives classes in the bakery and writes a weekly newsletter, which she snail-mails for free. “People are lonely,” she says. They want to receive real mail.
Feta-garlic snails at Belleville Bakery.Sheryl Julian
Born and raised in Halifax, Nova Scotia, MacDonald, 59, also lived in Vancouver. She met Beaulieu in Montreal. His large, striking artworks hang in the bakery.
In order to get a US E-2 Investor Visa, they had to invest $15,000 in a new US company (some applicants invest considerably more) and have secured premises in the destination city. Sight-unseen, they rented a painting studio in The Soda Plant in Burlington for Beaulieu, which qualified them.
The bakery’s name is the English version of Beaulieu’s surname. Beaulieu means “beautiful place,” she says. Belleville, which means “beautiful city,” is easier for Americans to spell.
Burlington Mayor Emma Mulvaney-Stanak, who happened to be there when I was — she said she stops by often since her office is so close — describes the bakery as “loveliness in this corner. [MacDonald] draws people into this community.”
Cinnamon snails at Belleville Bakery.Sheryl Julian
The bakery has become known for its I am Proud of Me Banana Cake. It’s really banana bread, but when MacDonald made it in France, customers wondered why it was called bread.
When you buy one, MacDonald asks you what you’re proud of. She’s heard many comments, mostly emotional. One woman in her 20s was going to drive on the highway for the first time, someone else was excited to have completed exams. Then a man came in to say he was proud of his wife for finishing chemo.
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“She’d been planning this cake during her treatment,” MacDonald told a local TV reporter who did a segment on her. Donations started coming in so other cancer patients at the local hospital could get a banana cake; MacDonald also sends cakes to a palliative care center and a teen drop-in center.
Those efforts came to the attention of a program director at the University of Vermont, who called MacDonald in the middle of Vermont’s dark, cold February winter. The administrator was running a mental health day for freshmen. She bought 100 banana cakes from MacDonald and asked her to come and hand them out.
The line was an hour long. Students waited patiently, not just to get an I am Proud of Me Banana Cake, but also for a moment to tell MacDonald what was on their mind.
Belleville Bakery & Catering, 217 College St., Burlington, Vt., www.bellevillevt.com
Sheryl Julian can be reached at sheryl.julian@globe.com.
BOSTON (WHDH) – The Boston Pops are preparing for their Fourth of July Fireworks Spectacular this weekend with half a million people expected to celebrate the United States’ 250th birthday on the Charles River Esplanade.
The President and CEO of Boston Symphony Orchestra said an even bigger celebration is being prepared at the hatch-shell this year.
“Everything is bigger. You only turn 250 once!” said Chad Smith, President and CEO of Boston Symphony. “We recognize that Massachusetts has been a center of revolution, not just in the Revolutionary War, but through the last 250 years. That spirit, sense of innovation, the sense of pushing our country forward is going to be on display as well.”
Organizers are bringing in lighting, sound equipment, extra stages, and of course – the fireworks.
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“Planning to bring in new details and amplify the experience on the Fourth of July with a bigger firework show. They’re going to have drones for the first time, amazing talent,” said Kate Fox, Executive Director at the Massachusetts Office of Travel & Tourism.
This year’s spectacular is being hosted by actress Jane Lynch, and will feature performances by country star Lainey Wilson, Chance the Rapper, Trombone Shorty, and Broadway star Megan Hilty.
“We’re going to have remarkable artists that represent the vast diversity and breadth of American music,” Smith said.
The Boston Pops have been performing on the Esplanade for the Fourth of July Fireworks Spectacular for 52 years, and organizers said this year’s show will highlight the history of Massachusetts.
“The history of the Pops is so closely tied to the Massachusetts story on the Fourth of July,” Fox said.
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The fireworks show will begin at 9:15 p.m., and will be set to live music from the Pops.
(Copyright (c) 2026 Sunbeam Television. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.)
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Pittsburgh officials are partnering with a nonprofit to provide a unique way to thank veterans for their service while getting a grand look at the Steel City.
A 90-foot Ferris wheel dubbed the Salute to Service Wheel will be spinning on the North Shore from Wednesday through Sunday.
It’s provided by Piatt Companies and Piatt Sotheby’s International Realty with half of ticket sale proceeds going to Veterans Leadership Program.
First launched in 1982, VLP helps veterans navigate life’s transitions. Efforts include wellness services, housing, career development and various support programs.
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Mayor Corey O’Connor, parks and recreation director Eric Sloan, Piatt Companies CEO Lucas Piatt and representatives from the Veterans Leadership Program are expected to host a grand opening celebration Wednesday around 12:30 p.m. at North Shore Drive and Art Rooney Avenue and take the first rides.
It is part of Pittsburgh’s Independence Day celebration.
Tickets are on sale now and cost $11.20, including a $1.20 service fee. They can be found at pittsburghpa.gov.
Bookings are in hour intervals from 2-9 p.m. Wednesday, Thursday, Friday and Sunday and from 2-8 p.m. Sunday.
Riders smaller than 48 inches tall must be accompanied by an adult.
