Today, U.S. Congressman Adriano Espaillat released the following statement regarding last night’s DREAMER arrest and ongoing targeted raids conducted by the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).
“As a former DREAMER and as a father, I am outraged by ICE enforcement actions to round up immigrants, issue deportations without due process, and conduct raids targeting and terrorizing the immigrant community.
“Wake up, Republicans! This is President Trump’s new America, and we should all be scared.
“In the past week, ICE has detained nearly 700 undocumented immigrants, including the mother of two U.S. citizen children, and just yesterday, a 23-year-old DREAMER with no criminal record who was taken from his father’s home.
“I am outraged and I am sad, as this is not the America that I know!
“In the words of poet Robert Burns, a man’s inhumanity to man makes countless thousands mourn, and the manner in which these individuals are being plucked from their homes, families, and communities during ICE raids is unnerving, wrong, and simply inhumane.
“I say to the President and my Republican colleagues in Congress, these are my constituents, they are your constituents, they are human, not cattle, and our approach to immigration reform should take into account the human elements involved when detaining these individuals under a false pretense of our national security.
“Our immigrant community is made up of hard-working people with families, friends, and neighbors who love them. As a United States Congressman, I say to the immigrant community under attack, to the mothers and fathers who are in distress, and to the DREAMERs who are unsure of their future, that rest assured, I will fight for you until there is nothing left in me to ensure you are safe, these raids end, and our country is back on track as the beacon of freedom and opportunity for which America is best known.”
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