Bronx, NY — As of October 13th, Oscar Belgal remains in solitary confinement with a bullet still in his neck while the scope of ICE terrorist violence expands across the country. Andre Easton, public school teacher and congressional candidate for NY-15, released the following statement:

“Last week, an ICE agent shot Oscar Belgal, a 28-year-old father and immigrant, in the Bronx. The bullet is still lodged in his neck. "

“Oscar’s doctors say he urgently needs surgery to remove it. He is being held in solitary confinement at the Metropolitan Detention Center in Sunset Park, awaiting deportation proceedings. He has lost feeling in the left side of his face. His attorneys say he hasn’t been fed a proper meal since the shooting and has been forced to drink from a bathroom sink.

“Today in Houston, ICE agents ran a man over with their car and broke both of his legs.

“Abolish ICE now. End all forms of immigrant detention. Prosecute and jail all killer ICE agents. Full rights for all immigrants.

“ICE’s presence in our city puts every New Yorker in danger. We cannot let masked men carry AR-15s through our communities with a license to shoot anyone they decide is a threat. There has been no accountability for the agents who killed Renee Nicole Good and Alex Pretti, and that tells ICE agents everywhere they are above the law.

“This violent reality reflects the betrayal of both establishment parties and their ultimate loyalty to the billionaire agenda. Time and again, Democrats have failed to deliver meaningful immigration reform, leaving millions of workers vulnerable. Now Trump and his team of billionaire bigots feel free to unleash state-sanctioned violence on immigrant communities, threatening the rights and safety of us all.

“We won’t end ICE terror by relying on the politicians who built the deportation machine and keep funding it. We need a mass movement powerful enough to dismantle it and win full, equal, and permanent rights for all immigrants.

“Here at home, Mayor Mamdani must do everything in his power to get ICE out of New York City. That means firing Jessica Tisch. It means disbanding the NYPD’s Strategic Response Group, which brutalizes New Yorkers who stand up to ICE. And it means fully enforcing his own Executive Order 13: no ICE staging grounds in public parking lots, and no ICE at Rikers. The city can do far more to obstruct Trump’s rampaging paramilitaries.”