A database containing personal information of thousands of undocumented immigrants living in New York City could be destroyed in order to keep it from the hands of Donald Trump and his administration, New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio said Thursday.
The data was collected originally for New York's IDNYC cards, which serve as free and official proof of identification but can be received without a legal immigration status, CNN reports. The resulting database contains the names of cardholders as well as their addresses and dates of birth, although applicants aren't required to disclose their immigration status to get a card.
Trump has threatened to deport 11 million undocumented immigrants with a "deportation task force," although de Blasio waved off the threat. "[Trump] can change some federal laws but the Constitution protects a lot of the rights and powers of localities," de Blasio said. As an additional safeguard, the ID law allows for the database to be "destroyed" at the end of the year in case a "Tea Party Republican" won the White House, one of the law's sponsors told CNN.
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"We're not going to tear families apart. So we will do everything we know how to do to resist that," de Blasio said.
New York City is home to almost half a million residents who do not hold legal immigration status.
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