Neighbors of the illegal alien shot by ICE agents this week in the Bronx are pushing back hard on Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s description of the man as a “New Yorker.”
Mamdani, upon hearing of an opportunity to score political points with his low-information supporters, balled up his little Communist fist and raged over the shooting while proudly claiming him as one of the Big Apple's own.
"This afternoon in Marble Hill, a New Yorker was shot by an ICE agent in a residential neighborhood," he wrote on X late Thursday. "This is an unconscionable and incredibly serious situation. I have called the President; when we speak I will demand that he ends all ICE enforcement actions in our city."
Oh noes, tough guy.
Descriptions of any illegal alien as being a citizen of the place where they are illegally squatting are absurd. He is not a New Yorker. He is not an American. He is, however, a criminal. Period. End of story.
And his neighbors weren't too thrilled with Mamdani's characterization.
I am angry tonight. Because today ICE shot a New Yorker. They shot a New Yorker while his five year old child was in the car. ICE makes this city less safe. We want them out. Now. https://t.co/ZizKB0OP7S
— Mayor Zohran Kwame Mamdani (@NYCMayor) October 9, 2026
Locals told the New York Post that the illegal alien aggressor, Oscar Belgal, is “absolutely not” a New Yorker, and one mother whose 12-year-old son was killed in gang violence called him “trash."
“I don’t consider him a New Yorker,” Migdalia Martinez told the outlet. "The only thing I do consider him as is trash, nothing else but trash. And I don’t consider New York, my home, as trash.”
The city, nah. The mayor, on the other hand ... well, you decide.
“Absolutely not. That’s one of the reasons I think we should vote blue out,” another neighbor told the Post when asked if Belgal should be considered a New Yorker. "What’s going on with the legal system, the jail, letting these people go after they have a whole list of convictions. This is a criminal. Why would you let this person out?”
On that note, the 28-year-old alien, a Dominican national believed to have entered the country illegally around 2022, has a conviction for grand larceny stemming from an armed robbery and a pending drug case involving fentanyl and other substances.
Federal authorities have also linked him to the Trinitarios gang as they investigated his possible connection to the shooting of an off-duty Border Patrol agent.
That's the guy Mamdani wants to put his arm around and stand shoulder to shoulder as they take on law enforcement trying to protect actual New Yorkers.
During Thursday’s enforcement operation, agents say Belgal accelerated his vehicle toward them with his 5-year-old son in the back seat before an officer opened fire, wounding him in the neck. Video backs up their story.
NEW: NYPD releases police security camera footage of part of the interaction between @ICEgov officers and Oscar Bergal in the Bronx—The start of the encounter can be seen but the cameras did not capture the shooting. 🎥 Via New York Police Department https://t.co/dARM6fqZbr
— Ali Bradley (@AliBradleyTV) October 9, 2026
"If I drove my car toward federal agents, as ICE alleges Belgal did, I’d almost certainly face heavy consequences," RedState's Bob Hoge writes, "but evidently Mamdani and the agitators believe that being here illegally is a get-out-of-jail-free card."
The case is essentially a Rorschach test for anti-Americans. They see this case and view ICE agents as the criminals putting the young boy's life in danger.
Sane people see it as them trying to rescue that child from a man willing to commit vehicular manslaughter while he's sitting in the back seat.