New York State Assembly Passes Bill to Delete the Term “Alien”

FAIR Take | May 2022

The New York Assembly passed a bill on May 17 which removes the term “alien” throughout state law and replaces it with vague and more legally imprecise terms.

Federal law defines an “alien” as “any person not a citizen or national of the United States.”  Since the 15th century, this term has been “the primary English term for those who are not a citizen of the country where they were residing.” Additionally, it has been used in federal law since the 1790’s. Despite this, last year, the Biden Administration ordered federal immigration agencies not to use the actual language of the law. Both California and Colorado shortly followed suit. Now New York is poised to remove the term as well.

Assembly Bill (AB) 10147, sponsored by Assemblywoman Maritza Davila (D-Brooklyn), was introduced on May 3.  The bill deletes the term “alien” from approximately 100 different sections of more than twenty New York law codes and replaces it with either “noncitizen” or “undocumented noncitizen.”

As FAIR has noted numerous times, adopting the term “undocumented” is simply a way for open-borders advocates to advance its open-borders agenda.  Changing the term to one that is more innocuous sounding transforms the public’s perception on the issue by glossing over the fact that their presence in the country is unlawful.  Instead, advocates for illegal aliens want the public to view illegal aliens as “rightful immigrants” who aren’t yet “documented” by the federal government.

AB 10147 moved rapidly through the legislative process, passing the Assembly Governmental Operations Committee on May 9 by a vote of 14-0. On May 17 it passed the Rules Committee 28-0 before passing the Assembly by a vote 137-9 the same day.

Upon receiving the Assembly bill, the Senate referred it to the Finance Committee along with a Senate companion bill sponsored by Senator Jessica Ramos (D-Queens), Senate Bill (SB) 9333.  On May 25, the Senate’s Rules Committee ordered the bills discharged from Finance and placed them on the Third Reading Calendar which means Senate could vote on them anytime.

It is likely that if the Senate votes on the bills, they would pass since  Democrats outnumber Republicans in the Senate 43-20.

While she was Erie County Clerk and serving in Congress, Gov. Hochul prided herself on being a pro-law enforcement moderate and opposing benefits for illegal aliens.  However, she has flipped her position on immigration issues and has not rescinded or even narrowed any of previous Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s sanctuary executive orders.  Her signature on one of these bills, if she received any of them, would be a foregone conclusion.

The New York legislature is scheduled to adjourn on June 2.