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By: Ellen Cans
Former New York Rep. Mondaire Jones is back in the political limelight, trying to make a comeback in challenging newbie Republican Mike Lawler in the upcoming election for New York’s 17th congressional district. In his current campaign, Jones claims that he supports tougher border security — but recently unearthed videos show that when he ran for office in 2020, he had championed “defunding” ICE, the federal agency which enforces immigration and protects national security.
As reported by the NY Post, in a Zoom call in 2020, Jones was asked by a leader with the New York Immigration Coalition if he supports defunding the federal Immigrations and Customs Enforcement agency and the US Customers and Border Protection Border Patrol agency. “I’m in support of that,” Jones had answered at the time. Jones had said in that 2020 call, that one of the reasons he ran for Congress in the Lower Hudson Valley is that he opposed then-predecessor Rep. Nita Lowey and other Democrats who had agreed to “increase the budget of ICE by 7% beyond the levels that had been approved by Republicans when they controlled the House of Representatives the year before.”
During another taped forum with the immigrant community in Peekskill, Jones had again criticized the increase in ICE funding. This time he went so far as to say that he would fight to give the 11 million undocumented immigrants who crossed the borders illegally a “pathway to citizenship.” “I will fight to give a pathway to citizenship for all of the 11 million undocumented people in this country,” Jones said.
Jones also supported giving undocumented residents the same educational opportunities as citizens, as well as legal counsel for all asylum hearings. Referring to his own degrees from Stanford University and Harvard Law School, Jones said, “I want everyone regardless of immigration status to have the same opportunities that I was able to have growing up. That should not be an exception.” Per the Post, he added that Dreamers — or undocumented young adults who came here as children seeking asylum — should have “permanent protection” in the US “regardless of who is the president of the United States.” Additionally, Jones had said he would fight against the “zero tolerance” policy for criminally prosecuting border-crossers.
When Jones was in office, he had co-signed a letter promoting the “No Border Wall Coalition” which demanded the removal of military officers from the US-Mexican border and advocated taking down border barriers including razor wire.
During his current comeback campaign, however, Jones is playing a different tune. In his bid to regain his old seat in the 17th House district, Jones said he supports the “bipartisan” Senate border security legislation that “would make progress to secure our border and hire more border agents.” The political action committee for House Democrats is also circulating advertisements saying Jones is “working to secure the border.”
The Lawler campaign commented saying, “Mondaire Jones will say or do anything to get elected. In 2020, he said the reason he was running for office was to defund ICE and Border Patrol, which is nuts,” said Lawler campaign spokesman Chris Russell. “Now, he’s
trying to say he supports border security because he knows it’s the only way he can get elected. But voters in NY-17 won’t be fooled by his lies. Mondaire’s real position is the one he got caught on tape professing: defund ICE and CBP.”
