Democrat Antonio Delgado Disparages Trump’s ‘Inhumane’ Immigration Policies

Rep. Antonio Delgado (D-NY) decried President Donald Trump’s immigration policies as “inhumane” and xenophobic, according to a report released Saturday.

Delgado, a swing district Democrat, claimed that President Donald Trump’s immigration policies moved a “bridge too far” after ICE has moved to enforce immigration law in the sanctuary cities and counties.

“I think there has been an energy, a dark energy, created around this issue, and the question is, to what end? It is very alarming what the administration is doing around the question of immigration,” the New York Democrat said.

Delgado represents one of the 13 congressional districts that President Trump won by more than six percentage points during the 2016 presidential elections and that Democrats flipped during the 2018 midterm elections. Republicans hope to retake roughly 18 congressional seats to regain the House majority. The New York Democrat defeated Republican incumbent Rep. John Faso (R-NY) by 5.2 percentage points during the 2018 midterm elections.

Delgado said that the Trump administration’s immigration enforcement policies have been “incredibly unhelpful.”

The New York Democrat added that ICE agents have targeted “upstanding individuals with no criminal backgrounds, who have voluntarily paid their taxes, and who are contributing positively to our communities all through this district.”

“We have got to be in a place where we take serious thought about the ways in which this agency is being used and deployed by the administration,” he added.

Delgado also lamented that President Trump has not moved to pass the Dream Act, which would grant amnesty to millions of illegal immigrants.

“The president has done nothing to advance the ball,” he said.

Delgado said that America needs to have border security; however, the “notion we have to be inhumane to do so, the notion that we have to tap into xenophobia to do so, I find incredibly unacceptable.”