Mayor Johnston on the Migrant Crisis, ¡Viva! Streets, and His Iconic Corduroy Jacket

With busloads of migrants still arriving in Denver nearly every day, Mayor Mike Johnston just returned from a second trip to Washington, DC, lobbying the federal government for emergency action. So in our semi-regular sit-down with the mayor, host Bree Davies and producer Paul Karolyi ask him why this situation is so dire right now, what happens if Congress won't give him what he wants, and whether or not he’d be willing to risk prison time testing out an innovative new legal theory. Plus, we get the deets on his increasingly iconic corduroy jacket, question his commitment to multi-modal transportation post-¡Viva! Streets’ cancellation, and give him a listener question on the snowplowing problems we all know are coming soon. 

Mayor Johnston mentioned the House Homeland Security Committee’s planned impeachment of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas over the temporary work authorization program that allowed some migrants who arrived in Denver last year to work. 

UPDATE: After the mayor left the studio, one of his aides told us she’d checked with the Downtown Denver Partnership and they told her ¡Viva! Streets cost closer to $1 million in 2023, which is still quite a bit higher than the $650,000 their executive director, Kourtny Garrett, told us a couple weeks ago. 

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Learn more about the sponsors of this episode:

• Denver Health
• Denver Art Museum - “Untitled: Artist Takeover,” Jan. 26 6-10 p.m. 

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