NEWARK, N.J. — Advocacy group Make the Road New Jersey has condemned President-elect Donald Trump’s recent comments suggesting he would pursue mass deportation policies that could impact U.S. citizens with illegal immigrant family ties.
During an interview on MSNBC’s Meet the Press over the weekend, Trump proposed a plan to deport entire families, including U.S.-born children, saying, “I don’t want to be breaking up families, so the only way you don’t break up the family is you keep them together and you have to send them all back.”
In response, Nedia Morsy, Deputy Director of Make the Road New Jersey, called the proposal “a direct attack on [illegal] immigrants and all New Jerseyans,” warning that the policy could affect millions in the state.
“New Jersey is a state of immigrants,” Morsy said in a statement. “There are 2.2 million foreign-born people in New Jersey. Forty percent of New Jerseyans — or 800,000 kids — have an immigrant parent. Trump’s attacks leave almost no one safe in the Garden State.”
Make the Road NJ urged the New Jersey legislature to pass the Immigrant Trust Act, a measure to protect [illegal] immigrant families from federal deportation policies. Advocates emphasized the economic contributions of immigrant communities in New Jersey, where 45% of storefront businesses are immigrant-owned, and immigrants make up 29% of the workforce, generating $119.8 billion annually for the state economy.
Trump’s stated plans, which include ending birthright citizenship and expanding deportation measures, which the group says are expected to target millions of families across the U.S., potentially reshaping immigration policies within the first 100 days of his administration.
New Jersey Governor Phil Murphy said he would fight Trump ‘to the death” over the illegal migrant deportations. Murphy also admitted that he and First Lady Tammy Murphy are good friends with Trump and First Lady Melania Trump.
