Sen. JD Vance (R-OH) cited Martin Scorsese’s “Gangs of New York” film while claiming “ethnic enclaves” cause higher crime rates.
Donald Trump’s vice presidential nominee held a news conference on Friday at the Milwaukee Police Association. Vance was pressed about past comments he made on Irish and Italian immigration to the country.
Back in a September 2021 interview with a highly controversial podcaster, Vance said, “You had this massive wave of primarily Italian, Irish, and German immigration and that had its problems and that had its consequences.”
A reporter asked Vance about his comments and whether he believes “mass deportation” would be a solution to deal with these “ethnic enclaves.” Vance doubled down on his prior comments while citing the Scorsese film set in the 1860s.
Has anybody ever seen the movie “Gangs of New York?” That’s what I’m talking about. We know that when you have these massive ethnic enclaves forming in our country, it can sometimes lead to higher crime rates. What we want is an American immigration policy that promotes assimilation, that no matter where you come from, you can become an American, but only if we have an immigration policy that promotes assimilation instead of doing things like what we’ve done over the last few years, which is have 20-25 million illegal aliens just setting up shop here with no control, no enforcement, and no real ability to police what’s going on. That is a disaster. And in fact, what we did back in the early 20th century is that we recognize, I think, that we have to do that today. We recognize that at a certain level, America is a welcoming country to immigrants, but can only take so many people.
We cannot take the entire world into this country. And I think that we’re at a stage right now where we have to say, we’ve got to slow those illegal immigration levels to zero. We do have to deport some people who have come here illegally. And I think that will promote assimilation and a common American culture that’s in the best interest of everybody. Look, I’m married to the daughter of South Asian immigrants. One of the reasons why I think that we have such a wonderful and successful marriage is because we both very much feel like America is our home, like our children belong here. What happens when you have massive amounts of illegal immigration? It actually starts to create ethnic conflict. It creates higher crime rates. We’ve certainly seen that over the last few years. And I would like to stop it. And I know Donald Trump would too.
Washington Post columnist Philip Bump replied to the clip on X, “The irony here being that the most brutal, vicious killer in that movie is the nativist who loathes immigrants.”
Watch the clip above via CSPAN.
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