A socialist running for Congress in New York says illegal immigrants who commit crimes should not face ICE enforcement or deportation, calling that extra scrutiny a constitutional violation based on birthplace.

Daily Mail reporting captures Democratic congressional hopeful Darializa Avila Chevalier telling WNYC’s Who’s Running This Place podcast that authorities should not target convicted criminals with immigration enforcement under any circumstances.

The 32-year-old socialist is the Democratic nominee for New York’s 13th Congressional District, covering upper Manhattan and the Bronx. She defeated incumbent Adriano Espaillat in the primary and has the backing of New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani.

On the podcast, she compared how the system treats citizens and non-citizens who break the law. Citizens go through the criminal courts, she said. Non-citizens face something more.

"Think about for example the way we deal with folks who are citizens who engage in criminal activity, they go through the criminal system, they are tried and then they pay their debt to society,"

She continued:

"But if that person is for some reason not a citizen or is born elsewhere, all of a sudden they have to face an additional level of scrutiny through ICE (Immigration and Customs Enforcement)."

Then she drew her line:

"That is, in itself, a violation of our constitution on the basis of where someone was born."

That argument treats immigration consequences as illegal discrimination. It also treats deportation of criminal illegal immigrants as off-limits. A clip of the remarks drew hundreds of thousands of views after it circulated online, including in an October 19, 2026 post summarizing her claim.

Chevalier has not limited the point to minor offenses. After an ICE agent shot 28-year-old Dominican national Oscar Belgal in New York City earlier this month, she moved fast against local police leadership.

Belgal was described as a suspected Dominican gang member. A lengthy criminal record later emerged. At a rally, Chevalier argued that history “doesn’t even matter.” The day after the shooting, she demanded the resignation of NYPD Commissioner Jessica Tisch and accused her of shielding what she called a “militia” of armed ICE officers. The Democratic Socialists of America joined the push for Tisch’s immediate removal, a fight that fits a wider pattern of Mamdani-aligned pressure on the NYPD commissioner.

Her record goes further than one shooting and one podcast. During her run she has deleted social media accounts that held older posts. Those posts included a blunt line on borders and removals.

"Yes literally abolish the border, all deportation is wrong."

She has also pushed “no more police at all, ever,” called the United States a “disgrace,” and labeled Joe Biden a “rapist” and a “war criminal” during the 2024 cycle. Other deleted material included crude remarks about black and Arab men with white women and a comment that “the pyromania associated with anarchism is very intriguing to me.”

Voters in the district got a preview of how she handles pushback. Earlier this year she faced questions over those posts during an interview with Excarlet Molina on El Vacilón de la Mañana. Molina said she was offended by Chevalier’s prior framing of the Dominican flag as “violent.” Chevalier removed her headphones and left, saying, “I am not going to sit here and be yelled at by various people.” Hours later she won the Democratic primary.

In April 2026 she was pictured being handcuffed by an NYPD officer during an anti-Israel protest. The same candidate now seeks a seat in Congress while arguing that ICE should not add immigration consequences when non-citizens commit crimes.

Mamdani’s endorsement ties her rise to City Hall’s left flank. That alliance already draws heat on other fronts, from an ethics complaint over city resources and Democratic candidates to ongoing fights with 9/11 families over ceremonial access at Ground Zero.

Chevalier’s constitutional claim is her own assertion. No court ruling in the available record backs the idea that enforcing immigration law against criminal non-citizens is barred because of birthplace. Federal immigration statutes have long treated unlawful presence and criminal convictions as grounds for removal. Her pitch flips that into a birthplace bias claim and pairs it with open calls to abolish the border and end all deportations.

That package is not a narrow dispute over case-by-case discretion. It is a rejection of the basic distinction between citizens and non-citizens after a crime. It also lands in a city that has already watched the costs of soft enforcement, gang activity, and political attacks on the officers asked to clean up the result.

National Democrats keep discovering that socialist nominees create midterm liabilities when the quotes are this plain. Chevalier’s own words put deportation of criminal illegal immigrants outside acceptable policy and place ICE scrutiny itself under constitutional suspicion.

Her primary win shows the lane is real inside the district. Her deleted posts, walkout, protest arrest, and demand to strip the police commissioner show the same politics without the polish. Mayor Mamdani’s backing only sharpens the choice voters and national Democrats now face when the nominee says criminal illegal immigrants should not be removed at all.

Separate fights around the mayor, including 9/11 families petitioning to keep him from Ground Zero ceremonies, underline how far left City Hall’s orbit has drifted from mainstream expectations on security and order.

Lawful residents, taxpayers, and crime victims live with the gap between campaign slogans and street reality. When a congressional hopeful says a non-citizen’s rap sheet “doesn’t even matter” and calls ICE follow-up a constitutional violation, the policy is not subtle.

Congress is not a podcast booth. Voters who want secure borders and equal enforcement for criminal illegal immigrants now have her position in her own words, and a clear measure of the mayor’s preferred successor in one of New York’s most visible districts.

If deportation of criminal illegal immigrants is framed as unconstitutional, the border is not a law. It is a suggestion. And suggestions do not protect a city.