Aliens Come From Other Planets, Not Other Nations, New Bill Says

NEW YORK CITY — Unless undocumented New Yorkers came to the city by way of Mars, they are human beings, not aliens, a new bill says.

Queens City Council Member Francisco Moya pitched a new bill Thursday that would replace the words "alien" and "illegal" immigrant" with "noncitizen" in official documents, records show.

"'Alien' is an outdated, politically loaded euphemism for 'noncitizen'—a clear and unambiguous word," Moya, a Democrat, explained on Twitter. "It’s time we remove 'alien' the City Charter and Administrative Code and bar referring to human beings as 'illegals' in future laws or city materials.

Moya's bill, first introduced in December, is not the first to address the loaded language around U.S. citizenship.

City Council passed legislation in 2019 to threaten to call immigration officials or use "illegal alien" as a slur.