Nydia M. Velázquez headshot
At a Glance
Seat
Representative for New York District 7
Born
March 28, 1953
Age 73
Phone
(202) 225-2361
Office
2302 Rayburn House Office Building, Washington 20515
Congress Member Profile|U.S. Representative|Democrat|New York District 7

Nydia M. Velázquez

Nydia Margarita Velázquez Serrano is an American politician and lawyer serving as the U.S. representative for New York's 7th congressional district since 2013. A member of the Democratic Party, she previously represented New York's 12th congressional district from 1993 to 2013, prior to redistricting. She chaired the Congressional Hispanic Caucus from 2009 to 2011. Velázquez is the first Puerto Rican woman to serve in Congress.

Source: WikipediaView full (CC BY-SA)
Voting Record — 496
Yes38%
No59%
Present0%
Not Voting3%
Party align97%
Cross-party0%
SoupScore
District Map

Congressional District 7

U.S. Census Bureau boundary data.
Nydia M. Velázquez headshot
Nydia M. Velázquez
U.S. RepresentativeDemocratNew York District 7
SoupScore
Nydia M.'s ATmosphere Activity
20 recent posts · 34 sponsored · 188 cosponsored
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Recent ATmosphere posts, sponsorships, and cosponsorships.

Today, I stood with fellow New Yorkers to tell Elon Musk and Donald Trump: hands off our government, our jobs, and our communities. Rain didn’t stop us. We showed up because we won’t let them hijack our democracy for the billionaire class.
Trump and Musk are hollowing out the Social Security Agency. Wait times and backlogs are already exploding, and they want to fire 1000s more workers. This is a betrayal of the American people who earned and rely on these benefits.
The Social Security Administration — already reeling from plunging customer service following a rapid downsizing under the Trump administration — is drafting plans to begin layoffs of potentially thousands more employees as soon as next week.
It should always be expected that universities defend their students, especially when they’re targeted, detained, & silenced for political beliefs. Yet, too many stay silent in the face of Trump’s attacks. Thank you, Tufts, for standing up. Rumeysa must be freed.
Tufts University petitions a federal judge to release student Rümeysa Öztürk, who was grabbed off the street by immigration officials. The move is some of the strongest public pushback by a school against the Trump administration's arrests of foreign students.
Head Start helps over 750,000 kids get the early education and support they need. Shutting down 5 regional offices with no warning and no plan puts those services at risk. Today, I led 33 House Democrats in demanding answers from HHS. Our kids deserve better.
Trans Day of Visibility is a reminder that trans people have always been part of our communities, and always will be. While Trump and the GOP try to erase trans lives, we’re fighting to ensure every trans person can live freely, safely, and authentically.
RFK Jr. lied to the Senate about his anti-vax agenda. Now, he’s pushed out the FDA’s top vaccine regulator during a measles outbreak. He’s unfit for the job and a threat to public health.
JUST IN: The FDA’s top vaccine official, Dr. Peter Marks, has been pushed out. In his resignation letter, he slams RFK Jr. for rejecting “truth and transparency” and pushing “misinformation and lies.” Marks warns of an “unprecedented assault on scientific truth.”
Trump is trying to kill collective bargaining for federal workers. That’s union busting, plain and simple. And if he gets away with it, he won’t stop there. This is an attack on all workers.
Stripping collective bargaining and union rights from workers across the federal government is the very definition of union busting — and a blatant attempt to silence us. We will fight this outrageous attack on our members with every fiber of our collective being.
Screenshot of the AFL-CIO's statement condemning the Trump administration's executive order stripping collective bargaining and union rights from workers across the federal government.
The Trump admin is weaponizing our immigration system to silence dissent against their foreign policy agenda. Targeting legal permanent residents for political speech is a direct attack on the First Amendment. If you care about the Constitution, you should be outraged.
NEWS | Yunseo Chung, a 21-year-old Columbia University student, and former high school valedictorian, is suing the Trump administration over efforts to deport her. Story first reported by The New York Times.
This isn’t mismanagement. It’s sabotage. Field offices are being gutted while phones ring off the hook and websites crash. DOGE is jeopardizing the well-being of nearly 70 million Americans receiving Social Security benefits.
The Social Security Administration is engulfed in crisis — further undermining its ability to provide reliable and quick service to vulnerable customers, according to internal documents and more than two dozen current and former agency employees and officials, customers and others.
Trump admin billionaires like Lutnick are so out of touch they can’t imagine the harm a missed Social Security check would cause most Americans. They can afford to shrug it off. Most Americans can’t.
Trump’s commerce secretary Howard Lutnick says if Social Security skipped a check, his mother-in-law wouldn’t complain—and if you would, it indicates you are probably a fraudster. Insane.
People with no criminal record are being deported and locked up in a foreign prison camp. No charges. No trial. Just gone. This is what it looks like when you destroy due process and trample the Constitution.
This will be in tomorrow's Border Update but deserves its own separate post: Profiles of 15 young Venezuelan men shipped off to El Salvador's prisons last Saturday. None of them seem to be gang members—not at all. Post is here, with links to sources: adamisacson.com/who-did-the-...
Who Did the Trump Administration Just Send to El Salvador’s Dungeons?

The list below is an excerpt from tomorrow’s Border Update, which I’m still drafting. But it deserves to be shared separately.

On March 20 CBS News obtained and published a full list of all 238 Venezuelan men whom the Trump administration sent to El Salvador on March 15, despite a judge’s orders. It appears that 137 had no due process at all—they were sent under the fourth-ever invocation of the Alien Enemies Act of 1798. The other 101 apparently had orders of removal.

But even though none committed any crimes in El Salvador, the government of Nayib Bukele sent them directly to the “Center for Confinement of Terrorism (CECOT),” a mega-jail built about two years ago to hold gang members, from which no prisoner is known to have been released.

For many of their loved ones, the CBS list was the first confirmation of their whereabouts. “Family members of the men say they’ve had no way to communicate with their loved ones,” noted Jonathan Lemire and Nick Miroff at the Atlantic, “So they study the [Salvadoran government’s] propaganda videos for glimpses of sons and spouses among the deportees.”

Here are profiles that I’ve seen of 15 of them, with links to sources. They really do not seem to be gang members at all.

    Gustavo Adolfo Aguilera Agüero, 27, had been living in Dallas with his wife since December 2023, when they entered the United States with a CBP One appointment. In early February 2025, Aguilera was arrested while taking out the trash outside their home, his wife told the Miami Herald. He has a nine-month-old U.S. citizen son. His tattoos include his older, Venezuelan-born son’s name, his name and his mother’s name, and a reggaeton lyric. His mother says he has no criminal record.
son’s name, his name and his mother’s name, and a reggaeton lyric. His mother says he has no criminal record.
”JABV,” a 24-year-old who was abducted and beaten for carrying out campaign work on behalf of opposition leader María Corina Machado in 2024. His attorney stated that he has no criminal record in either the United States or Venezuela, no removal order, and “his tattoos are a Rose, a Clock and a Crown with his son’s name on it.”
Franco Caraballo, a 26-year-old barber detained in Dallas on February 3 when he reported to a regular check-in with ICE. His wife, Johanny Sánchez, insists he has no gang ties. “She struggles even to find logic in the accusation,” the Associated Press reported. Caraballo has several tattoos, including an image of a clock commemorating his daughter’s birthday. He had called Ms. Sánchez on the evening of March 14, Reuters reported, to tell her that he was probably being deported to Venezuela even though he had a pending asylum claim.
”L.G.,” who has no removal order and a pending asylum claim. His attorney stated, “L.G. has three tattoos: one is a rosary, the other is his partner’s name, and the third is a rose and a clock.”
Edwuar Hernández, a 23-year-old man from Maracaibo, was arrested along with three friends at the Dallas townhouse they shared on March 13. Relatives tell the Washington Post that he had no gang ties and no criminal record in Venezuela. (See the narrative for Mervyn Yamarte below.)
Francisco Javier García Casique, a 24-year-old barber from Maracay, Venezuela, had a clean criminal record. He tried to make a living in Peru for four years before migrating to the United States. “He doesn’t belong to any criminal gang, either in the US or in Venezuela… he’s not a criminal,” his mother told the BBC. “My brother doesn’t belong to any criminal group, has no criminal history or record in any country and they have unjustly sent him to El Salvador simply because of his tattoos,” the Guardian reported that his brother wrote on I…
because of several tattoos.”
Andy Javier Perozo, a 30-year-old father of five from Maracaibo who was doing food delivery gig work, was arrested along with three friends at the Dallas townhouse they shared on March 13. Relatives tell the Washington Post that he had no gang ties and no criminal record in Venezuela. (See the narrative for Mervyn Yamarte below.)
Jerce Reyes Barrios, a 36-year-old former professional soccer player who was imprisoned and tortured after marching in two early-2024 demonstrations against the Maduro regime. Reyes has a tattoo of the Real Madrid soccer team’s logo and had a picture of himself in his social media feed making a rock-and-roll hand gesture that DHS officials decided was a gang sign. He had already submitted a document showing he had no criminal record and a declaration from the tattoo artist, to no avail. He has two daughters, aged two and six.
Ringo Rincón, a 39-year-old man from Maracaibo, was arrested along with three friends at the Dallas townhouse they shared on March 13. Relatives tell the Washington Post that he had no gang ties and no criminal record in Venezuela. (See the narrative for Mervyn Yamarte below.)
Anyelo Jose Sarabia, age 19, is an asylum seeker detained during a scheduled January 31, 2025 check-in with ICE in Dallas. His brother’s statement reads, “The tattoo on his left hand is of a rose with money as petals. A picture of the tattoo is below. He had that tattoo done in August 2024 in Arlington, Texas, because he thought it looked cool.” (His sister said something similar to Reuters.) Another tattoo is the words “strength and courage,” and another is a bible verse; both were applied by Anyelo’s brother, who has no criminal record in the United States or Venezuela.
”E.V.,” who fled Venezuela after being imprisoned and tortured for participating in a 2022 protest. His attorney said he “has only one arrest in the U.S., which resolved with a non-criminal disposition under New York state law and for which he receiv…
Henry Javier Vargas Lugo, a 32-year-old, had been living and working odd jobs in Aurora, Colorado after trying to make a living as a mechanic in Colombia for seven years. He entered the United States with his mother and daughter. “He has several tattoos, including crowns with his niece and mother’s name, a clock on his arm and a rosary,” the Miami Herald reported.
Mervyn Yamarte, a 29-year-old who entered the United States in 2023 after passing through the Darién Gap and lived in Dallas, is “‘a good, hardworking boy’ who had never been involved in crime,” his mother told the Guardian and the BBC. His wife said the same to the Washington Post, which reported that armed ICE officers showed up on March 13 at the townhouse where he and three friends from Maracaibo had been living, and hauled them away. Yamarte’s younger brother witnessed the arrest; he said that the agents asked whether he had tattoos. One of Mervyn Yamarte’s tattoos is his daughter’s name. Another reads, “strong like Mom.” Yamarte appears—shaved, wincing, but recognizable—in the video shared by Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele on March 16.
An unnamed client of Lindsay Toczylowski, an attorney at the Los Angeles-based Immigrant Defenders Law Center (ImmDef), is an LGBTQ+ artist and asylum seeker whose tattoos included a verse from the Book of Isaiah. “They’re fairly benign. Clearly not gang tattoos,” Toczylowski told Mother Jones. “In my 15 years of representing people in removal proceedings in the United States, this is the most shocking thing that I’ve ever seen happen to one of our clients,” she told the Guardian.
Trump’s attack on the Department of Education is an attack on our children. It will be devastating for kids and parents in New York. Bigger class sizes, fewer resources, and less support for students with disabilities and low-income families.
In the richest country on earth, it's unthinkable that we would cut health care benefits for our most vulnerable. Today, I stood with Medicaid beneficiaries & health care workers at Brooklyn Hospital Center to say NO to GOP Medicaid cuts.
I'm devastated by the loss of my dear friend Nita Lowey. Her leadership and kindness made it an honor to serve alongside her in the House. As the first woman to chair the Appropriations Committee, she broke barriers and paved the way for so many. May she rest in peace.
The GOP’s CR is a total abdication of Congress’ duty. It hands power to Trump & Musk to continue to destroy our government and slash vital programs while they enrich themselves. Democrats must FIGHT BACK, not roll over. The Senate must vote NO on cloture.
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Voting History
496 total votes
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Recent roll calls with party-majority context so it is easier to scan how this member tends to vote.

DateBillQuestionPositionParty MajAlign?Result
2025-06-03H.R. 1642 (119th)Fast-track passageYESYESPassed
2025-05-22H.R. 1 (119th)Final passageNONOPassed
2025-05-22H.R. 1 (119th)Send back to committeeYESYESFailed
2025-05-22S.J. Res. 31 (119th)Final passageNONOPassed
2025-05-22H. Res. 436 (119th)Approve resolutionNONOPassed
2025-05-22H. Res. 436 (119th)End debate nowNONOPassed
2025-05-22H. Res. 436 (119th)Consideration of the ResolutionNONOPassed
2025-05-22H. Res. 436 (119th)Consideration of the ResolutionNONOPassed
2025-05-22Motion to AdjournYESYESFailed
2025-05-20S.J. Res. 13 (119th)Final passageNONOPassed
2025-05-20H.R. 1223 (119th)Fast-track passageYESYESPassed
2025-05-20H. Res. 426 (119th)Approve resolutionNONOPassed
2025-05-20H. Res. 426 (119th)End debate nowNONOPassed
2025-05-19H.R. 1286 (119th)Fast-track passageYESYESPassed
2025-05-19H.R. 1263 (119th)Fast-track passageYESYESPassed
2025-05-15H.R. 2240 (119th)Final passageYESYESPassed
2025-05-15H.R. 2255 (119th)Final passageNONOPassed
2025-05-14H. Res. 352 (119th)Motion to Suspend the Rules and AgreeYESYESPassed
2025-05-14H.R. 2243 (119th)Final passageNONOPassed
2025-05-14H. Res. 405 (119th)Approve resolutionNONOPassed
2025-05-14H. Res. 405 (119th)End debate nowNONOPassed
2025-05-14H.R. 2215 (119th)Fast-track passageYESYESPassed
2025-05-13H.R. 249 (119th)Fast-track passageNOT_VOTINGYESPassed
2025-05-13H. Con. Res. 30 (119th)Motion to Suspend the Rules and AgreeYESYESPassed
2025-05-08H.R. 276 (119th)Final passageNONOPassed
2025-05-08H.R. 276 (119th)Send back to committeeNOT_VOTINGYESFailed
2025-05-07H.R. 881 (119th)Final passageNONOPassed
2025-05-07H.R. 1503 (119th)Fast-track passageYESYESPassed
2025-05-06H. Res. 377 (119th)Approve resolutionNONOPassed
2025-05-06H. Res. 377 (119th)End debate nowNONOPassed
2025-05-05H.R. 36 (119th)Fast-track passageNOYESPassed
2025-05-05H.R. 530 (119th)Fast-track passageYESYESPassed
2025-05-01H.J. Res. 88 (119th)Final passageNONOPassed
2025-05-01H.J. Res. 78 (119th)Final passageNONOPassed
2025-04-30H.J. Res. 89 (119th)Final passageNONOPassed
2025-04-30H.J. Res. 87 (119th)Final passageNONOPassed
2025-04-29H.J. Res. 60 (119th)Final passageNONOPassed
2025-04-29H.R. 859 (119th)Fast-track passageYESYESPassed
2025-04-29H.R. 1442 (119th)Fast-track passageYESYESPassed
2025-04-29H.R. 1402 (119th)Fast-track passageYESYESPassed
2025-04-29H. Res. 354 (119th)Approve resolutionNONOPassed
2025-04-29H. Res. 354 (119th)End debate nowNONOPassed
2025-04-28S. 146 (119th)Fast-track passageYESYESPassed
2025-04-28H.R. 973 (119th)Fast-track passageYESYESPassed
2025-04-10H.R. 22 (119th)Final passageNONOPassed
2025-04-10H.R. 22 (119th)Send back to committeeYESYESFailed
2025-04-10H. Con. Res. 14 (119th)Accept Senate changesNONOPassed
2025-04-10H.R. 1228 (119th)Fast-track passageYESYESPassed
2025-04-10H.R. 1526 (119th)Final passageNONOPassed
2025-04-09H.R. 1526 (119th)Send back to committeeYESYESFailed

Alignment stats consider only votes where a clear yes/no majority existed for the legislator's party. Cross-party marks divergence where the vote matched the opposite party majority. ↔ indicates cross-party divergence.

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