The President of the California State Senate said “half his family” are in the U.S. illegally and in possession of false documents.
Kevin De Léon, a Democrat from Los Angeles, made the comment last week when he introduced a bill to designate the state of California as a “sanctuary state.”
“I can tell you half of my family would be eligible for deportation under [President Donald Trump’s] executive order, because if they got a false Social Security card, if they got a false identification, if they got a false driver’s license prior to us passing AB60, if they got a false green card, and anyone who has family members, you know, who are undocumented knows that almost entirely everybody has secured some sort of false identification,” he said.
De Léon expressed outrage that President Trump’s executive order would allow for the deportation of illegal immigrants who possess fraudulent documents or commit identity fraud to obtain a Social Security number during an interview the next day.
“Someone simply who received or purchased a [fraudulent] Social Security card down at McArthur Park, or elsewhere in my district would be eligible immediately for mass deportation,” he said.
During the interview, host Larry Mantle asked if De Léon believed that possession of a fraudulent Social Security card warranted deportation.
“I don’t think so … the vast majority of immigrants — hard working immigrants — have done that. I can tell you I have family members specifically who came here as undocumented immigrants, and they did the same thing,” he said. “That’s what you need to do to survive in this economy.”
De Léon represents the 24th Senate district, which encompasses the unincorporated area of East Los Angeles as well as numerous neighborhoods in the eastern part of the city of Los Angeles.
The district itself is nearly 67% Hispanic, while the community of East Los Angeles is, at 97% Hispanic, the least ethnically diverse area of Los Angeles County.
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