NEW YORK – When the federal government increased its deportation efforts in the mid-1970s, Bishop Nicholas DiMarzio, then a priest in the Archdiocese of Newark, recalls the harm it caused by forcing many undocumented immigrants into situations that led to injury, even death.

“It was horrible … they would surround these buildings, go into them, and people would jump out of windows and get hurt. Some people even got killed … it was bad,” DiMarzio, who led the archdiocese’s immigration services at that time, told Crux.

DiMarzio, bishop emeritus of the Diocese of Brooklyn, described his experience in the 1970s to contextualize the mass deportation efforts that President-elect Donald Trump has promised and are a top priority once he is inaugurated on Jan. 20, as well as the House of Representatives recent passage of legislation to detain undocumented immigrants charged with certain crimes.

The Laken Riley Act, passed by the House last week, focuses on the detainment of migrants who have been arrested for, and/or convicted of burglary, theft, larceny or shoplifting. The bill, which will likely be voted on by the Senate this week, is named after University of Georgia nursing student Laken Riley, who was killed last year by an undocumented immigrant from Venezuela.

DiMarzio said the legislation, and the mass deportations that are expected to follow, is a step in the wrong direction – “a vigilante approach to a mythical problem that these people are hurting us.”

“It’s an unfortunate situation where you’re not dealing with facts you’re dealing with a prejudice or an idea that once we get rid of all of these undocumented people that the country’s going to be in great shape,” he said. “It’s very reminiscent of other countries where you scapegoat a group of people and decide that if we get rid of them everything will be fine.”

DiMarzio is an expert on immigration policy. Among other roles, he was executive director of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops Migration and Refugee Services from 1985 to 1991. He also chaired the USCCB Committee on Migration from 1998 to 2000, and in 2000 he became a member of the Pontifical Council for the Pastoral Care of Migrants and Itinerant People.

In retirement, he still publishes a monthly column titled “Walking With Migrants.”

The types of immigration policies being supported in Congress and prioritized by Trump also show how the government’s vision for the nation’s immigration system continues to move further and further away from that of DiMarzio and other Catholic leaders, which they have advocated for for decades.

On Jan. 6., the same day the House passed the Laken Riley Act, the USCCB published an in-depth resource titled “Catholic Elements of Immigration Reform.” The timing was coincidental – the USCCB published the resource before the House vote finished. Still, the differences in the approach of each illustrates just how far apart the sides are their vision for immigrant reform.

The USCCB resource details six elements it deems essential to immigration reform:

– Element 1: Enforcement efforts should be targeted, proportional, and humane

– Element 2: Humanitarian protections and due process should be ensured

– Element 3: Long-time residents should have an earned pathway to citizenship

– Element 4: Family unity should remain a cornerstone of the U.S. system

– Element 5: Legal pathways should be expanded, reliable, and efficient

– Element 6: The root causes of forced migration should be addressed

As it stands, nothing indicates Congress nor the incoming administration have any of those elements in mind when crafting immigration legislation and policy. If that were to change, DiMarzio said the place to start is with element 3, giving long-time residents an earned pathway to citizenship.

“I think that’s probably the only place to start because then you start to regularize that those who are contributing can stay, and that’s also a message to others who maybe just came over the border who maybe don’t have a valid reason to get asylum,” DiMarzio said.