The border disaster is rising as a sizzling situation for the Home seat within the Hudson Valley’s seventeenth District, and Dem ex-Congressman Mondaire Jones’ prior excessive lefty positions on it may come again to hang-out him.
Jones backed lax borders and criminal-migrant amnesty throughout his earlier stint in Congress earlier than calling for harder border safety measures throughout his comeback bid to topple first-term Republican Rep. Mike Lawler within the district, which incorporates components of Westchester and Rockland counties, information present.
Whereas in workplace, Jones co-signed a letter selling the “No Border Wall Coalition” that demanded the elimination of navy personnel from the US-Mexico border area and advocated for the take-down of boundaries similar to razor wire.
“The continued navy presence on the border threatens your vow to revive America’s ethical and strategic standing on the worldwide aircraft,” stated a March 8, 2021, letter despatched to President Biden and co-signed by Jones.
In a Fb submit simply weeks earlier, Jones additionally had blasted the US Supreme Courtroom for letting former President Trump “get away with” constructing a wall to assist safe the border in addition to impose a ban on immigration from Muslim international locations.
He voted in opposition to Republican-sponsored amendments to cease gang members and intercourse offenders from acquiring a path to citizenship, too — together with migrants from the Tren de Aragua gang that’s presently terrorizing residents of New York.
Jones additionally beforehand blasted funding for Immigration and Customs Enforcement and referred to as the border-control company a “racist establishment” whose brokers commit “unimaginable cruelty” alongside the border.
“The cruelty is the purpose. And the truth that the Home of Representatives, managed by Democrats, gave $1.4 billion to #ICE is trigger for soul-searching. We’ve acquired to do higher as a celebration,” Jones stated in a June 6, 2019, assertion on X when he first ran for Congress.
On February 3, 2021, Jones, who’s black, stated, “We’re simply three days into #BlackHistoryMonth and ICE has already despatched planes filled with Black individuals to Cameroon and Haiti in defiance of @POTUS ’ govt order. ICE is a racist establishment.”
He supported laws to restrict deportations and provides immigration judges extra discretion in proceedings, which critics claimed inspired “catch and launch” insurance policies.
On his web site, Jones now says he helps the “bipartisan” Senate border safety deal that will bolster border safety and rent extra border brokers.
However Lawyer’s marketing campaign claimed Jones is altering his stripes to cover his pro-open borders, pro-amnesty document.
“Mondaire Jones was ranked as one of the radical politicians in your complete 117th Congress due to his excessive document. Mondaire helps Sanctuary Cities and amnesty for intercourse offenders and gang members whereas opposing border wall funding,” stated Lawler marketing campaign spokesman Chris Russell.
“He additionally referred to as for defunding ICE and attacked federal immigration officers as racists. Mondaire’s votes and rhetoric created the present mess at our border, and he’d make it even worse ought to he get again to Congress,” the Lawler rep added.
Jones had no instant remark.
On his web site, Jones slammed Lawler for rejecting a proposed border deal that by no means handed the Home and didn’t make it to a vote within the full Senate.
Jones is looking for a comeback to Congress after two years within the political wilderness.
After redistricting in 2022, Jones determined to relocate and ran for the Home seat within the tenth District, which covers decrease Manhattan and brownstone Brooklyn. He misplaced within the Democratic main to now-Rep. Dan Goldman.
Jones then shifted again to the seventeenth District this yr to tackle Lawler, who defeated ex-Rep. Sean Patrick Maloney, former chair of the Home Democrats’ marketing campaign arm.
This yr’s seventeenth District end result may assist determine which political get together controls the Home of Representatives subsequent yr.
The Cook dinner Political Report charges the race a toss-up.
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