House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries stood shoulder-to-shoulder with an illegal immigrant who has lived in the United States for 37 years without learning English and demanded a path to citizenship — for anyone who has managed to evade deportation for as little as seven years.
The scene laid bare the Democratic Party's priorities: lawbreakers get a microphone and a champion; American citizens get the bill.
Margarita Cielo Balbuena, a Dominican national who has resided illegally in the United States since 1989, spoke at a New Jersey press event this week flanked by Jeffries and Rep. Rob Menendez. She delivered her demands in Spanish through an interpreter.
"We need a path to citizenship for those of us that have been present for at least seven years in this country," she said. She also demanded an end to immigration enforcement raids that she said "terrorize" Dover, New Jersey.
Balbuena was detained for two months at ICE's Elizabeth Detention Center following a May 23 arrest. She described agents in masks spraying her family with pepper gas and dragging her husband — recovering from back surgery — from their truck. Her adult son, an American citizen, demanded to see a judicial warrant and was ignored, she said.
HotAir noted that nowhere in the sympathetic press coverage of Balbuena's detention ordeal was it mentioned that she and her husband have been living here illegally for nearly four decades.
The optics were devastating. A woman who has had 37 years to learn English — who claims to be a homeowner, business owner, and employer — still needed a translator to address the American public. Former CBP commander-at-large Gregory Bovino distilled what millions of Americans were thinking: "You have lived in the United States since 1989. That is 37 years. You still need a translator. At a Democratic event you stood up and demanded a path to citizenship for anyone who has been here just 7 years. Notice the arrogance. Notice the entitlement."
Jeffries, for his part, used the event to demand the closure of Delaney Hall, another ICE detention facility in New Jersey. "Delaney Hall needs to be shut down," he said. "The behavior that ICE is engaging in is inconsistent with our values and what America should represent."
The White House pushed back, telling Fox News Digital that "these types of smears by sanctuary politicians are contributing to our ICE law enforcement" challenges.
HotAir cataloged the long trail of broken promises on amnesty: the 1986 Immigration Reform and Control Act was sold as a one-time deal that legalized roughly 2.7 million illegal aliens. It was followed by the 1994 Section 245(i) rolling amnesty, its 1997 extension, and more. Each amnesty begets the next, and each one tells millions of waiting legal immigrants that cutting the line pays off.
The open question is whether either party will ever enforce the immigration laws already on the books — or whether "comprehensive reform" will always mean the same thing: amnesty first, enforcement never.
