Socialist Ocasio-Cortez: Caravan 'Refugees' Have Right to Asylum in U.S.

Socialist Democrat candidate for Congress Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez in New York’s 14th District says the caravan of between 7,000 and 10,000 migrants is comprised of “refugees” who have a right to claim and seek asylum in the United States.

Ocasio-Cortez, who has led the Democrat Party’s “abolish ICE” movement, said the migrant caravan headed to the U.S.-Mexico border in order to overwhelm the country’s asylum and immigration system should not be referred to as a “caravan,” but rather as a group of “refugees” who have a legal right to enter the country.

“These are refugees using legal routes to seek & apply for asylum,” Ocasio-Cortez said of the caravan. “At this point, if you are an outlet adopting the president’s language to describe this as a ‘caravan,’ you‘re playing yourself. And letting him play you.”

In another post online, Ocasio-Cortez criticized NBC News for noting the border crossings have risen in the last year, saying: “Repeating Trump’s rhetoric without fact-check is completely irresponsible, especially in a time of rising white supremacist violence.”

Ocasio-Cortez’s remarks encouraging Central Americans to come to the U.S. to seek asylum come as migrants with the caravan have repeatedly admitted that they are ineligible for asylum, as Breitbart News reported, and caravan organizers have disparaged “white voters” in America and noted that the migration is a “mass exodus” to the U.S.

The caravan of migrants is made up of primarily job-seekers and previously deported illegal aliens, neither of which make the Central Americans eligible for asylum in the U.S.

“It’s time for me to go back to the United States. It’s a country where I can live my life, unlike Guatemala,” 36-year-old Job Reyes told the Washington Post. Reyes was deported from the U.S. after over-staying his visa for 14 years.

Sen. Kamala Harris (D-CA) has encouraged the mass migration from Central America, remarking that Americans should be “welcoming” and “tolerant” to mass immigration and caravans.

Ocasio-Cortez has made similar comments in the past. Months ago, the self-proclaimed socialist said that illegal aliens deserve a “right of passage” to freely enter the country.