Dem lawmaker launches petition to block deportation of 9/11 recovery worker

06/28/17 03:33 PM EDT



Rep. Joe Crowley (D-N.Y.) launched a petition Wednesday to block the deportation of a Sept. 11 recovery worker, calling the possibility "shameful," according to a press release.

Carlos Humberto Cardona, who helped remove hazardous material from ground zero at the sight of the 2001 New York City attack, was taken into custody in February and is facing deportation, the New York

Daily News reported earlier this month.

Crowley called the possibility of Cardona being deported “shameful,” pointing to his health problems that arose after working at the World Trade Center site.

"Mr. Cardona is facing the threat of deportation because of President Donald Trump's anti-immigrant agenda,” Crowley said in a statement. “Instead of expressing our gratitude as a nation that Mr. Cardona helped clean and contain the World Trade Center site, our government is doing everything it can to deport a man who is facing serious health problems because of the work he did on our behalf. This is shameful.”

Crowley said in the petition that deporting Cardona would “send a message to the immigrants who call our country home that even if they serve our country during its darkest days, we will not welcome them in our communities.”Cardona came to the United States in 1986 as a 17-year-old to avoid the risk of political danger in Colombia, where two of his brothers were killed by anti-government rebels, his wife told the Daily News.

Cardona first had a removal order issued for him in May 2000 after facing a drug sale conviction in 1990, the news outlet reported.

Crowley, in the press release, said Gov. Andrew Cuomo (D-N.Y.) had granted him “clemency for a decades-old minor drug offense, effectively clearing any criminal record and making clear that Mr. Cardona should be allowed to stay in the U.S.”

But the New York lawmaker, who has been working with representatives for Cardona, added: “There is still a risk that the Trump administration proceeds with deportation.”

http://thehill.com/homenews/house/33...cleanup-worker