AOC Defends Mahmoud Kalil, Says She Is 'Advocating For Him And Agitating For His Release'

Forbes Breaking News

At her town hall event in Queens, New York, on Friday, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) decried the treatment of Mahmoud Kalil.

Transcript

00:00here after reconciliation um which is some of the things that we're seeing on immigration

00:06of course immigration this is an issue that is very near and dear to our community

00:10our community is overwhelmingly immigrant immigrant families first second generation

00:16and we want to make sure and one of our highest priorities

00:19is keeping families together while keeping our community safe point blank period

00:30and i want everyone here to know and to understand that my office is a safe place for casework

00:40if you need or have any questions about your status or your family status we are able to process things

00:48we will not share any information if we need to do an inquiry on your case we will ask for that

00:53permission to do so and we have been able to clear up a lot of casework and a lot of issues in people's

01:01status through my office so if you know someone that you think or they feel like they're hiding

01:07in the shadows that they're afraid that they don't know who to reach out to that they they either

01:12maybe have lost their status through some sort of missed deadline or something like that please

01:17encourage them to reach out to our office we have a great track record and we are very very often

01:23able to help people get on the right track regularize their status or figure out what their options

01:29are that being said we the trump administration they like to say and this is what trump ran on

01:34right he said we're only going to go go after the quote-unquote criminals

01:39yeah exactly we're only going to go after the quote-unquote criminals however their position is that

01:46everyone undocumented is a criminal that's what they think they think that the docker recipient

01:52that the baby that was here from two years old whose only country they have ever known is the united

01:58states that maybe have served in this country or now as a doctor is a quote-unquote criminal they think

02:04every they think that folks who are undocumented are that but on top of that they're not even just going

02:11after undocumented people they are making people undocumented by revoking legal status and they are starting that

02:20with tps something known as temporary protective status and parole programs that is an area in

02:28which people that have huge where there's huge amounts of political or other kinds of instability

02:34at home the united states agreed to officially create almost like a legal status by which people

02:41from that from those areas fleeing some of the harshest conditions in the world can come to the united

02:46states and offer for status in fact we fought for tps for venezuelan refugees not too long ago and um and

02:54they are canceling tps programs so people who are here lawfully they are canceling these tps programs to

03:01make them undocumented in order to go after them so this is not about anti quote-unquote illegal immigration

03:09this is anti-immigration and it is very important that we understand that and cut through the rhetoric

03:15and cut through the nonsense because they do not have a leg to stand on when it comes to this argument

03:22they've also ramped up deportations including deportations to guantanamo and also to el salvador

03:28which is completely illegal and i don't even want to call them deportations they are sanctioned kidnappings

03:33in many circumstances you know they want to talk about why america is great or making america great

03:48our civil liberties and our civil protections are part of what makes america great it is our democracy

03:55and when you want to shred up our constitution and eliminate due process that that is it it is one

04:05of the most it's attacking what it means to be an american and it it is direct it is a uh eroding and

04:12degrading what it means to be an american when we rip up our constitution and due process and that's

04:17exactly what they're doing here um we have of course attacks on free speech we have our own mahmoud

04:23khalil in columbia for a columbia student who was uh detained and is detained and we've been in close

04:30contact with his family in advocacy for his case um in order to release him from the louisiana detention

04:36center that he is in but he was if we there is there the only grounds in which he was detained with him

04:44exercising his free speech in order to advocate for palestinian human rights and to end the war in gaza

04:51and we have to make sure that that we are advocating for him and agitating for his release we recently

04:56had another student in vermont that we were able to successfully advocate for his release he is out

05:01on bail that happened this week and we are hoping to be able to do the same thing for mahmoud khalil um

05:07uh and uh and i want you all to know that my office is personally tasked and assigned with that case

05:20mahmoud uh was a columbia student but our office has been able to take the lead on that case for

05:25the new york city delegation and we have been doing that um now additionally uh what we've also seen

05:36is that the trump administration has done has done absolutely they have broken it's not even enough to say

05:44that they have broken norms historically if you were undocumented you could still pay taxes in the united states

05:51and millions of people undocumented people pay taxes in this country in the hope that they can

05:57one day regularize their status and be on a path to citizenship the trump administration has decided to

06:04end that firewall between the irs and ice as well as uh with the with hud the housing and urban development

06:12and so there's now unprecedented data sharing that is happening that is very dangerous and i think it

06:17should be dangerous for all of us this is not just about immigrants this is about all of our privacy

06:22and all of our civil rights um but what we've also been doing is i've been hosting know your rights

06:28seminars through my office uh so that communities across the across our district understand what their

06:35rights are if ice knocks on your door they do not have carte blanche to enter point blank period

06:41and if they do if they do want to knock on your door or knock on anyone's door including your workplace

06:51you can tell them show me a warrant show me a judicial warrant and uh and if they don't show you a

07:00warrant you can say you can come back with a warrant you have the right to turn them away unless they

07:05have the proper paperwork or coming in the proper way and when we first did one of these seminars uh tom

07:12holman then acting director of ice said that he was going to threaten to refer me to doj um because i'm

07:20using my free speech rights in order to advise people of their constitutionally guaranteed protections

07:26and he may want to do it again today and to that i say come for me you're gonna have to come for me

07:35do i look like i care because we the way that we guarantee in this moment when people say

07:46how do we protect against everything that's going on how do we make sure that we can what can we do to

07:53prevent this erosion all this stuff that's happening we do it by exercising and using our constitutional

08:00rights our rights are use it or lose it so we need to use it and we need to challenge them so don't

08:10let them intimidate you into thinking that you're doing something wrong by telling people what their

08:15actual legal constitutional rights are there's nothing wrong about it and there's nothing illegal

08:21about it and if they want to make it illegal they can come take me that's how i feel about it

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