Ken Cuccinelli, acting deputy secretary of Homeland Security, said the suspect in Saturday’s Hanukkah stabbings that targeted a Jewish community in Monsey, New York, was the “son of an illegal alien” in a now-deleted tweet.
“The attacker is the US Citizen son of an illegal alien who got amnesty under the 1986 amnesty law for illegal immigrants,” Cuccinelli tweeted. “Apparently, American values did not take hold among this entire family, at least this one violent, and apparently bigoted, son.”
Grafton Thomas, the 37-year-old suspect, was pulled over in a gray Nissan Sentra with a license plate that matched the eye-witness description of a car that left the scene of the crime. Thomas, whose family friends said has a history of mental illness, was reportedly found covered in blood.
Cuccinelli, 51, is the former attorney general of Virginia and has spearheaded immigration reform during Trump’s first term in office. In October, he clashed with Democrats at a House Oversight and Reform Committee hearing, telling Missouri Rep. William Lacy Clay, “If you cared enough to pass a law, we’d enforce it.”
[Read more: ‘Worst Mayor in NYC’: Giuliani and de Blasio trade punches in online spat about anti-Semitic attacks]
