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Protesters upset over Mayor Bowser's call for Nat. Guard help with migrants
Protesters aren't pleased with how Mayor Muriel Bowser is handling the migrant situation in D.C. On Thursday, demonstrators crashed her early birthday event in Southwest to ask her why she isn't providing sanctuary for the migrants being dropped off in D.C. from border states.
WASHINGTON - Protesters are demanding answers after Mayor Muriel Bowser put in a request for the D.C. National Guard to help with the increase of migrants being bused into the District.
In two separate letters sent to The White House and the Pentagon Thursday, Mayor Bowser asked for federal help. The mayor described the situation as a humanitarian crisis that has reached its tipping point.
Some volunteers with mutual aid groups tried to interrupt an event the Mayor was hosting Thursday night at The Point D.C. in Southwest.
We are told it was an early birthday celebration and a campaign event.
Protesters arrived on foot and on a boat to remind the mayor that D.C. is a sanctuary city.
"The situation is here, and it is coming, people are staying in D.C. It is a D.C. issue, it is not just a federal issue," M. Felix Macaraeg said. "And we are either going to welcome people with dignity and respect or we're going to pass trauma down line."
READ MORE: DC requests National Guard assistance to help with migrant bussing crisis
While most protesters stayed outside the event, a couple were able to make it inside and confront Mayor Bowser, including Mara Levy who told FOX 5 about her encounter.
"So I started asking her, 'Why won't you provide aide to these people? Why won't you provide, try sanctuary to these people? Why won't you greet people with dignity our city could do this? Why won't you?" he said.
Levy tells FOX5 the mayor ignored her questions.
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DC mayor asks for National Guard to help with migrants
After years of calling the nation's capital a "sanctuary city" for illegal immigrants, D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser is now pleading with the White House to send in the National Guard to deal with a flood of undocumented migrants who have been arriving on buses from border states.
At a press conference on Thursday, Bowser did address her request for 150 national guard personnel.
She says "We need to make sure there is a national response not an ad-hoc city by city, state by state response. We know the federal government does this because we see this type of response with Afghan refugees, and now we see it with people coming to the United States from Ukraine"
FOX 5 reached out to the Department of Defense. They tell us that they've received the mayor's request, it is currently pending, and they are taking this situation serious.