by Jason Hopkins
Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren announced that she is open to the idea of putting a hold on all deportations of illegal aliens, making her the latest Democratic presidential candidate to adopt the position.
Warren, one of the leading Democratic presidential contenders, headlined a Friday event organized by Mijente, a progressive Latino group that focuses on immigration issues in the U.S. During a question-and-answer segment, a female member of the audience asked her if she would put a moratorium on all deportations, including illegal aliens who have criminal records.
“I am so sorry for the troubles that you and your five children face,” Warren told the woman. “I am open to suspending deportations, particularly as a way to push Congress for comprehensive immigration reform.”
“I believe that what we’re doing right now with ICE, focusing on people who do not pose a threat. When ICE comes into our communities, takes our neighbors, our friends, our family members, that they do not make this country safer,” she continued. “We need ICE and Customs and Border Patrol [sic] — it is focused on real threats,” she said, botching the name of Customs and Border Protection.
“Tearing families apart is not that,” adding that low-level crimes should not be a qualifier for deportation, calling it “fundamentally wrong” and a reason why she supports the decriminalization of illegal immigration altogether.
The comments make Warren just the latest Democratic candidate to take such a progressively liberal position on immigration.
Independent Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders, for example, released his immigration platform Thursday, calling for a moratorium on deportations, the decriminalization of illegal immigration, the dismantling of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and Customs and Border Protection (CBP), and the acceptance of 50,000 “climate migrants” within the first year of his administration.
In fact, Sanders first announced his proposal to stop all deportations during the same Mijente event in September.
Warren’s call for a deportation suspension came after she released her $52 trillion Medicare for All plan. The senator said a large source of funding for the proposal would come from the legalization of illegal aliens living in the country, but as the Daily Caller News Foundation first noted, her data wrongly cited a Congressional Budget Office report that did not take into account universal coverage.
Conservative operatives promptly attacked the Massachusetts senator for wanting a ban on deportations.
“Elizabeth Warren is single-handedly exposing her party’s open-borders agenda, which would endanger communities across the country. It’s no wonder national Democrats are panicking over the electability of their 2020 frontrunners,” America Rising Communications Director Chris Martin told the DCNF on Friday.
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Jason Hopkins is a reporter for the Daily Caller News Foundation.
