Tag: deportation
Zohran Mamdani

New York Republicans Beg Trump To Deport Zohran Mamdani

New York’s Young Republican Club has urged President Donald Trump's administration to revoke Democratic mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani’s U.S. citizenship and deport him under the Communist Control Act after his win in the New York City Democratic mayoral primary on Tuesday night.

The New York Republican club wrote a post on the social platform X Wednesday, urging President Donald Trump’s aides to take action.

“The radical Zohran Mamdani cannot be allowed to destroy our beloved city of New York," the post read. It added: "The Communist Control Act lets President Trump revoke @ZohranKMamdani’s citizenship and promptly deport him."

"The time for action is now — @StephenM and @RealTomHoman, New York is counting on you," the tweet read, tagging the official handles of White House deputy chief of staff Stephen Miller and immigration advisor Tom Homan.

Mamdani, a 33‑year‑old democratic socialist and New York state legislator, defeated former Governor Andrew Cuomo in the Democratic primary Tuesday. The race drew national attention thanks to his progressive platform centered on rent freezes, free public transit, universal childcare and city-run grocery stores.

Born in Uganda and naturalized as an American citizen in 2018, Mamdani represents a generational and ideological shift in New York politics, energizing younger voters and gaining endorsements from leading progressive figures like Rep. Alexandria Ocasio‑Cortez (D-NY) and Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT.).

The nature of the New York Republicans' deportation demand — which would hinge on the 1954 Communist Control Act — means it has virtually no legal basis, given Mamdani’s clearly documented U.S. citizenship. The Communist Control Act of 1954 is a U.S. federal law that formally outlawed the Communist Party and criminalized membership in or support for communist organizations.

This is not the first time Mamdani has faced such an attack from Republicans.

Earlier this month, Republican City Council member Vickie Paladino also called for his deportation in a post on X.

Mamdani responded forcefully, condemning the demand as part of a broader wave of “Donald Trump’s authoritarian administration” rhetoric that has included death threats and Islamophobic attacks.

“This is what Trump and his sycophants have wrought," Mamdani said in a statement to reporters at the time.

Reprinted with permission from Alternet.

Mass Deportation

Lies, Damned Lies, And Mass Deportations

Donald Trump returned to power apparently convinced that America is being overrun with violent immigrant criminals. So all he had to do was order ICE to start rounding up these evildoers and kick them out.

However, tracking down undocumented immigrants who are also criminals has turned out to be a slow affair, because the great majority of immigrants — like the great majority of people in general — are law-abiding. In fact, the available evidence suggests that undocumented aliens are less likely to commit crimes than native born Americans. Things move a little faster if ICE ignores due process and just sends people it imagines might be criminals to overseas prisons. But this means sending people who may well be innocent — and legal residents — to horrifying gulags. And while such things don’t bother Trump or his top aide Stephen Miller, they do in fact bother many Americans.

Yet Miller, by all accounts, has been deeply frustrated at the slow pace of deportations. So the administration began just rounding up people who look to them like illegal immigrants. Again, the abandonment of due process and rule of law clearly didn’t bother them.

But the loss of an important part of the labor force bothered business interests. And so last week Trump suddenly announced that he wouldn’t be going after immigrant workers in agriculture and the hospitality industry, who are “very good, long time workers.”

What this meant, I guess, was that the dragnets will be limited to industries that employ large numbers of undocumented immigrants, but in which these immigrants are not a crucial part of the work force.

So I wondered how long it would take Trump to realize that there are no such industries. I mean, wait until he learned about who does the hard, dangerous work in the construction industry.

Sure enough, it only took a couple of days for the administration to reverse its policy of exempting farms and restaurants from immigrant raids. Anti-immigrant hardliners realized, even if Trump didn’t, that going easy on immigrants who are crucial to the economy would in effect mean abandoning the whole idea of mass deportation.

As often, it’s useful if disturbing to read what Trump says, unfiltered by media sanewashing.

Notice that Trump is still going on about “our crime ridden and deadly Inner Cities,” oblivious to the reality that homicides in major cities have plunged — in New York, where immigrants make up 37 percent of the population, murders were 83 percent lower in 2024 than in 1990, and have continued to fall rapidly this year. Note also that Trump has gone full Replacement Theory, claiming that Democrats are deliberately bringing in illegal aliens to “expand their voter base” (undocumented immigrants can’t vote.)

But in the context of Trump’s temporary move on farm and hospitality workers, the line that struck me was the one about how immigrants were “robbing good paying Jobs and Benefits from Hardworking American Citizens.” Which “good paying Jobs and Benefits” did he have in mind? Agricultural field work? Scrubbing toilets? Installing drywall?

Incidentally, not only do undocumented immigrants often do the most physically demanding and unsafe work, they are often deliberately misclassified as independent contractors, which means that they “do not have access to health insurance, medical leave, workers’ compensation insurance coverage, and safe workplace protections.”

The point is that in general undocumented immigrants don’t take good jobs away from native-born Americans. By and large they take jobs the native-born don’t want or would only take at much higher wages. This means that immigrants are complements, not substitutes, for native workers. They increase, not reduce, native-born wages. And mass deportation, if it really gets going, will be an economic as well as a human catastrophe.

Which doesn’t mean that it won’t happen. TACO doesn’t necessarily mean that Trump chickens out from bad policies. Sometimes it means chickening out from good, or in any case less bad, policies. In this case he has chickened out in the face of MAGA hardliners, retreating from a policy change that would have limited the damage from anti-immigrant fanaticism.

Reprinted with permission from Substack.

Bannon Urges Trump To Investigate, Defund And Deport Musk

Bannon Urges Trump To Investigate, Defund And Deport Musk

The feud between President Donald Trump and Tesla/SpaceX CEO Elon Musk is rapidly intensifying, and now one of Trump's most influential backers is calling on the president to deport the South African centibillionaire.

According to a Thursday report by the New York Times' Tyler Pager, Steve Bannon – who went from being Trump's 2016 campaign chairman to Trump's official White House chief strategist during his first term – wants his former boss to send the world's richest man back to South Africa. The MAGA podcaster told the Times that he was convinced that Musk's immigration status should be scrutinized.

"They should initiate a formal investigation of his immigration status because I am of the strong belief that he is an illegal alien, and he should be deported from the country immediately," Bannon said.

The far-right media figure is also suggesting that Trump suspend Musk's security clearances while investigating his immigration status. He added that the administration should also conduct an official probe into Musk's alleged drug use, which the Times reported on in late May, while also investigating the tech magnate's attempt to get a classified briefing at the Pentagon about the United States' war plans with China should a conflict between the two global superpowers break out.

Bannon has long viewed Musk — who was one of Trump's top campaign donors in the 2024 cycle – as one of his chief rivals. Just before Trump officially kicked off his second term, Bannon and Musk had a public feud over whether the incoming administration should increase or curtail the number of H-1B visas granted to foreign workers.

The ongoing spat between the world's richest man and the 47th president of the United States stems from Musk coming out in opposition to Trump's so-called "One Big Beautiful Bill Act," calling it a "disgusting abomination" and demanding Congress "KILL the BILL." His public criticism of the bill has also led to several Republicans who voted for the bill now attempting to distance themselves from it.

Bannon and Musk also symbolize the two dueling factions within the MAGA coalition, according to conservative journalist Jonah Goldberg of The Dispatch. Goldberg told CNN host Anderson Cooper on Wednesday that Bannon represents the populist/nationalist wing of MAGA that wants to halt immigration and protect social safety nets, whereas Musk represents the tech faction that wants to severely slash safety nets while loosening restrictions on immigration.

Reprinted with permission from Alternet.

Bondi Responds Feebly To Anti-Semitic Attack On Shapiro Residence

Bondi Responds Feebly To Anti-Semitic Attack On Shapiro Residence

Attorney General Pam Bondi has been everywhere lately—screaming about deportations, threatening 20-year prison sentences for anyone who so much as exhales near a Tesla, and doing her part to kill college scholarship programs for students of color.

But what she hasn’t done is use her power to investigate actual threats, like the arson attack at the home of Democratic Gov. Josh Shapiro of Pennsylvania.

After days of silence, Bondi finally addressed the attack on Wednesday, calling it “horrific” and saying she “firmly” believes the arsonist wanted to kill Shapiro. But she stopped short of calling it “domestic terrorism,” a label that Bondi and Republicans she’s aligned herself with have thrown at peaceful Tesla protesters without hesitation.

The message is clear: If President Donald Trump doesn’t see a political advantage, Bondi doesn’t see a crime.

On Thursday, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer publicly called on the Department of Justice to treat the attack with the seriousness it deserves, including investigating it as a possible hate crime.

Cody Balmer, who was arrested for allegedly starting the fire at Shapiro’s house, reportedly targeted the Jewish governor for his pro-Israel stance—an attack that occurred during Passover. Balmer is currently being held in jail without bail.

“In conjunction with the timing of the attack during Passover, Governor Shapiro’s visible embrace of his Jewish faith, and the context of rising antisemitism globally and across the country raise serious concerns about antisemitic motivation,” Schumer, who is the highest-ranking Jewish public official in U.S. history, wrote in a letter to Bondi.

“Our federal authorities must bring the full weight of our civil-rights laws to bear in examining this matter. No person or public official should be targeted because of their faith, and no community should wonder whether such acts will be met with silence,” he added.

The DOJ and the White House have not publicly commented on Schumer’s request, but Bondi isn’t the only one who’s been quiet.

Shapiro told NBC News that Trump has yet to call him or issue any meaningful condemnation. When asked about it earlier this week, Trump dismissed the suspect as “just a whack job,” while also noting, pointedly, that the man “was not a fan of Trump.”

Jewish Democratic Council of America CEO Halie Soifer criticized Trump’s silence, noting his previous attacks on Shapiro.

“Last year, Trump didn’t hesitate to call Josh Shapiro a ‘highly overrated Jewish governor.’ Now, nearly four days after Gov. Shapiro was targeted in an act of political violence—reportedly due to his position on Israel—Trump hasn’t clearly condemned it,” she said.

Meanwhile, some Republicans have fully victim-blamed Shapiro for the attack. Rep. Dan Meuser of Pennsylvania, a potential 2026 challenger to Shapiro, said during a radio interview that the governor’s rhetoric may have fueled the attacker’s rage.

“The left’s got to look in the mirror here. Our hearts go out to the Shapiro family on this, but you know, they gotta tone it down too. I mean, every action Josh Shapiro has taken so far against the president has either been a lawsuit or a falsehood,” Meuser said.

Though Vice President JD Vance—hardly known for his moral clarity—called the attack “really disgusting violence” on Sunday, that kind of vague half-condemnation isn’t nearly enough.

Shapiro’s home was destroyed. He and his family were targeted. Yet the response from the Trump administration—which has been so busy supposedly fighting antisemitism—has been mostly crickets.

Reprinted with permission from Daily Kos.

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