Sen. Andy Kim (D-NJ) called for prioritizing criminal illegal migrants being held at U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s (ICE) Delaney Hall detention center in Newark, New Jersey, calling them the Democrats’ “north star.”
“The detainees and their families need to be our North Star,” Kim wrote in a post on X. “We will fight to secure dignity for them because that’s who are in America.”
Other New Jersey Democrats, such as Reps. Frank Pallone (D-NJ) and Rob Menendez (D-NJ), have also called for prioritizing migrants’ needs above the needs of American citizens.
The New Jersey Democrats have also criticized President Donald Trump for stripping “any pathway to citizenship and belonging in America,” and have spoken about how they have tried to help detainees at Delaney Hall.
“When I visit Delaney Hall, the immigrants detained there always talk about how much they value the American dream,” Pallone wrote in a post on X. “They desire liberty and to return to work to provide for their families. They’re shocked that they can be stripped of due process and be put in a place like this — in what is supposed to be the land of the free.”
“Trump wants to strip any pathway to citizenship and belonging in America, and destroy the American dream,” Pallone added. “And he’s doing it in places like Delaney Hall.”
During an interview on MS NOW, Menendez explained how he spent a day and a half trying to help one illegal migrant.
“I went in about eight o’clock. At 10 o’clock after constant communication, ICE said they were not going to let me in, and I told them that’s a problem because I’m not leaving,” Menendez said. “So, I stayed there overnight. Eventually, the next morning, at 11:30, me and a couple other colleagues were allowed in. The first thing that ICE says to me, after having been there for fifteen hours, ‘Martin Soto’s not here.’ They moved him at two a.m. in the morning.”
In several posts on X, ICE shared photos of several of the people being held at Delaney Hall, including one person whose rap sheet includes battery, and another person whose rap sheet includes “manufacturing heroin/cocaine” and “possession of dangerous drugs.”
The Democrat lawmakers advocating for illegal aliens at the detention facility come after video footage posted to social media by independent journalist Nick Sortor on Saturday night, showed anti-ICE rioters setting fires in the street near the detention facility.
Law enforcement officials were later reported to have cleared Antifa protesters who were causing violence out of the area.
Breitbart News also reported on Friday that Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Secretary Markwayne Mullin received a win after New Jersey Gov. Mikie Sherrill (D) used local law enforcement to corral the anti-ICE protesters outside of the facility.
Breitbart News has reported that over the past few years, Democrat lawmakers have advocated for illegal migrants and mass immigration. In November 2022, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) stated that the United States was “short of workers.”
“We have a population that is not reproducing on its own with the same level that it used to,” Schumer added at the time. “The only way we’re going to have a great future in America is if we welcome and embrace immigrants, the dreamers and all of them.”
