Culture 05.16.18 at 11:35 am

Man Freaks Out & Threatens to Call ICE Because Someone Dared to Speak Spanish In NYC

By Yara Simón

05.16.18 at 11:35 am

Lead Photo: Photo by Yukinori Hasumi / Moment

Despite Spanish being widely spoken in the United States and around the world, some still take issue when someone speaks in the language of Cervantes. A video that Edward Suazo posted onto Facebook on Monday shows a gringo losing his shit after an employee at a midtown Fresh Kitchen addressed customers in Spanish.

“Your staff are speaking Spanish to customers when they should be speaking English,” he said. “Every person I listened to, he spoke it. He spoke it. She’s speaking it. It’s America… So I will be following up, and my guess is, they’re not documented. So my next call is to ICE to have each one of them kicked out of my country. If they have the balls to come here and live off of my money. I pay for their welfare. I pay for their ability to be here. The least they can do, the least they can do is speak English.”

While there’s no way to tell if the people this unnamed man is targeting are undocumented, it’s important to note that undocumented immigrants do not qualify for government benefits. Instead, they contribute billions of dollars to state and local taxes. So not only is his diatribe hateful, it’s also plain wrong. Also, New York City is a melting pot of cultures and home to hundreds of languages, including Spanish. (Honestly, has he spent any time in NY?) In the United States, there are more than 38 million Spanish speakers. In fact, there are more Spanish speakers in the US than Spain.

Anti-immigrant sentiment has long existed in the United States, but since the election of President Donald Trump, more have felt emboldened to voice their loathsome opinions. And though it’s disheartening to see instances like these continue to crop up, people continue to stand up for those on the receiving end of these vile words. In the video above, a woman can be heard defending the employee. The man unnecessarily talks about her body, because he’s an awful human being.

Check out the video below:

So my wife and her best friend Just experience what America is becoming !They where on there lunch time and ordering there food and just because they where speaking in Spanish to the waiter this asshole jumps in and started to call the waiter and my wife and her best friend all types of names and threatened to call I.C.E on them and the employees !!!!What a big man talking down to couple of women and a helpless employee. I wish someone tells me I can’t speak in my native language ! First of all they wasn’t talking to you !! Asshole !My country !! Haha 😆 I love the way people are just throwing that world around lately !! If you love this country this much ! Why don’t you put on uniform and protect it !!If he was so offended because the waiter was speak in Spanish only because of a native person spoke to him in Spanish, why don’t he start waitering and he won’t have that issue and family stop getting Spanish nannies and stop getting Spanish people to farm and ………You know where I’m getting !!So please stop !! Because in the end you need them ! But what you need to do is stop trying to control us ! Slavery stopped a long time ago !!Deena Gonzalez Emily Serrano

Posted by Edward Suazo on Tuesday, May 15, 2018

H/T Latino Rebels

Update, May 17, 2018 at 11:15 a.m. ET: The identity of the man has been identified as Aaron Schlossberg, a lawyer.

immigration new york city racism