Mehmet Oz in 2018 Pushed Amnesty for Illegal Alien Youths: ‘I Think the Dreamers Are Being Used as Political Points’

NEW YORK, NY - DECEMBER 05: Dr. Oz speaks onstage at the L'Oréal Paris Women of Worth Cel
Brian Ach/Getty Images for L'Oréal Paris
Matthew Boyle
Washington, DC

Dr. Mehmet Oz, the celebrity doctor now running as a candidate for the Republican nomination for U.S. Senate in Pennsylvania, as recently as 2018 was publicly advocating for amnesty for illegal alien youths.

Asked in an interview with Asli Pelit in 2018 what he thinks about so-called “DREAMERs,” Oz replied that he thought the illegal alien youths were being used by both parties to score “political points.”

“I think the DREAMERs are being used as political points and both parties are gonna have to figure that out – people should not be penalized because we can’t get our thoughts together,” Oz replied.

Oz also pushed for lifting quotas on the number of migrants America brings into the country legally, advocating specifically for more doctors.

“We do need an immigration policy, I believe, that rewards merit,” Oz said. “If I’m trying to bring a heart surgeon to America… why would that be hindered because of some abstract quota that no one can defend? I can understand, you don’t want immigrants who are undocumented, may be have dangerous past… I get all the politics, but we don’t want to penalize the dreamers for that.”

This 2018 interview is not the only time Oz promoted the cause of illegal alien youths. In the summer of 2019, the celebrity doctor who now claims to be a Republican tweeted a photo of himself meeting with a group of so-called DREAMERs. In the tweet he said in part that the illegal alien youths were “building themselves and America”:

Oz’s history with immigration is particularly tenuous, as his ownership in a family company that was issued the largest fine ever in the history of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) for a scheme of hiring and rehiring illegal aliens has been a front-and-center campaign matter. The New York Post unveiled the explosive revelations earlier this year, and the story has beset the Oz campaign since.

What’s more, while Oz was born in Ohio, his parents being from Turkey means he has citizenship both in the autocracy and in the United States. Oz served in the Turkish military by choice—but not in the United States military—to maintain his dual citizenship, and he continues to maintain it to this day. Oz has, under immense pressure from campaign rivals, said he will renounce his Turkish citizenship if he is elected to the U. S. Senate—but he continues to keep the dual loyalties for now. He says the reason he will not relinquish Turkish citizenship and pledge allegiance solely to the United States is because his mother, who has Alzheimer’s, is in a facility in Turkey and he maintains the dual loyalties so he can care for her.

But according to the Washington Post, this arrangement, should Oz not follow through on his campaign promise to ditch his Turkish citizenship after the election, would be unprecedented.

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