While our society seems to be drowning in an unrelenting torrent of lies, propaganda, and half-truths, we may draw some comfort from the fact that, over time, many of history’s most outrageous deceptions eventually were conquered by truth. The Titanic was the great unsinkable ship, until it sunk. The Third Reich was supposed to rule for 1,000 years and was gone after 12. More recently, Joe Biden was proclaimed to be “sharp as a tack,” until the truth could no longer be concealed .

A similar inconvenient truth is now crashing into the once lauded concept of sanctuary cities. Sanctuary cities sound great to those who filter life through their emotions. Was it ever practical, however, to defy federal authority and declare large, metropolitan areas safe zones for foreign nationals who violate our immigration laws? No, but it did wonders for making supporters of the idea feel compassionate and superior to anyone who raised warning flags. And no politicians has been punished for advancing this project. Thus was born the sanctuary city concept in the 1980s, and it spread to communities throughout the land.

With a body of evidence spanning four decades now, it is time to judge sanctuary cities not by their pseudo-humanitarian goals, but by reality. Many of America’s largest, once-beautiful cities have been brought to their knees by overcrowding, crime, and the astronomical costs of providing for the never-ending flow of illegal aliens to their communities.

New York has been hard-pressed to house its overflow of new migrants and recently finalized a nearly $77 million contract with the city’s hotel association to place migrants in 15 properties across Brooklyn, Queens, and the Bronx. This comes after a previous $275 million deal with the hotel association to shelter more than 5,000 illegal aliens. Meanwhile, the city’s native born homeless sleep on sidewalks as shelters meant for them have been repurposed for noncitizens.

This is just one part of New York’s sanctuary solution, which also includes lodging migrants in luxury Times Square hotel rooms. Mayor Eric Adams said he “does not see an ending” to the migrant crisis that sanctuary policies invited and that it will “destroy New York City.”

The sanctuary ethos has also welcomed organized crime syndicates from other countries, which have quickly set up shop here to exploit America’s permissiveness. New York has also seen the arrival of the violent Tren de Aragua gang from Venezuela, which has masterminded a crime ring that steals New Yorkers’ smart phones, uses the financial data on them to plunder victims’ bank accounts and then sells the phones in South America. The gang has also used the migrant hotels as a fertile recruiting ground for new members.

In sanctuary Chicago, migrants have been sleeping on the floors of police stations and airports. The Windy City has seen an 11,000 percent increase in arrests of Venezuelans since the border crisis began.

In Denver, Mayor Mike Johnston announced that his city will be reducing funding for its police force by $8.4 million to accommodate the needs of its surging alien population. The fire department and other public services would also see budget cuts, freeing up roughly $45 million for noncitizens.

In light of this nightmarish track record, support for sanctuary policies is waning even in one-party rule, blue-state havens like New York. Some communities are abandoning sanctuary policies altogether. The mayor and Common Council in East Chicago, Indiana, located 18 miles from downtown Chicago, recently decided to repeal their “welcoming city” ordinance which enacted sanctuary policies and prohibited local law enforcement from cooperating with federal immigration authorities. The ordinance was in violation of a state law banning sanctuary jurisdictions.

Did East Chicago’s leaders suddenly have an epiphany to prioritize their legal residents over illegal aliens? No, they concluded the virtue signaling of a “welcoming city” ordinance was not worth the trouble. In 2011, attorneys from the Immigration Reform Law Institute (IRLI) had helped write Indiana’s statewide ban on sanctuary jurisdictions, which requires local law enforcement to cooperate with the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). In 2018 IRLI sued the city on behalf of two residents, arguing that the ordinance violates both the U.S. Constitution and state law.

Indiana Attorney General Todd Rokita recently filed a suit against the city alleging that the ordinance was a violation of state law. The city caved. In response to East Chicago’s decision to repeal its ordinance, Rokita’s office dismissed the suit.

What can be learned from East Chicago? Most sanctuary mayors are so ideologically invested in sanctuary policies, they will not abandon them even when their own constituents are suffering as a result. Demanding state sanctuary bans, however, will force mayors to be in violation of state laws, which allows courageous state attorneys general like Rokita to force compliance.

The legal residents of this country, despite what it may often seem to be the case, are not powerless to affect positive change. They just need to demand more of their representatives and stop accepting the calamitous status quo. Sanctuary cities need to become a distant memory, a failed experiment that should never again be repeated.