Sen. Chuck Schumer says tea party members "hate immigrants," and blames congressional Republicans' fear of their hard-right members for preventing passage of a Senate immigration bill last year.
"If Speaker John Boehner, the leader of the House, put it on the floor today, it would pass," Schumer, a New York Democrat, declared on "Reaching Out With Gregory Floyd," a radio program hosted by the president of Teamsters Local 237.
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"Why doesn't he? Because the tea party, these 80 to 100 folks from the hard right, none from New York, say they hate immigration, they hate immigrants.
"One person told me in this immigration move, they wouldn't let Albert Einstein come into this country if he wanted to, amazingly enough, and they block it."
BuzzFeed, which posted the interview on its website Wednesday, said the exchange was released Monday, with a date listed as March 21.
However, Floyd references the 2014 midterm election in his interview with the New York lawmaker, indicating the exchange took place before last November's election.
In the interview, Schumer slams conservative Iowa Republican Rep. Steve King, labeling him the tea party "leader" in Congress.
"Their leader is a guy named Steve King from a rural district in Iowa," Schumer tells Floyd.
"He says the most outrageous things about immigrants. He says they are all drug dealers, and this and that and the other stuff. He calls them all kinds of names. And in the Republican Party, even though they know the right thing to do is pass the immigration reform bill, so afraid of the tea party, that they are doing nothing."
It's not the first time Schumer has laid into King over immigration.
On May 1, 2014, Schumer identified King as the reason the House had been unable to take up any immigration reform efforts.
"Steve King — a far-right, way-out-of-the-mainstream outlier — doesn't just spew hatred, he calls the shots," Schumer said,
The Hill reported at the time.
"They're following Steve King over the cliff."
In the Floyd interview, the veteran Democrat also took a pot shot at rural Western states, insisting the immigration bill was supported by lawmakers from states with immigrants – and largely opposed by "the people who don't have any immigrants, states from Wyoming and stuff like that."
Schumer says not passing immigration reform will ultimately be "hurting Republicans politically."
"No Hispanic community is going to vote for them with their attitude, but they are still doing it," he says. "So I want to get this passed for the good of America, for the good of the 11 million living in the shadows, for the good of the industries and things like that."
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