JACKSONVILLE, Fla. — Controversial comments led to criticism of Jacksonville Mayor Donna Deegan.
Mayor Deegan spoke on Times Radio, a London radio show, this week about former President Donald Trump's immigration policy.
Deegan said: "To put people in what would really amount to a concentration camp type situation to round them out of the country, doesn't seem to me to be a very American thing to do."
The mayor's comments quickly were heard across the world, and mixed responses began coming out from people including leaders in Jacksonville.
Jacksonville Sheriff T.K. Waters released a statement Wednesday calling the comments "shocking and reckless" by equating "a commonsense immigration policy with one of the most horrific atrocities of the 20th Century."
Councilmember Rory Diamond, wanting the Mayor to apologize for her comments, called them disturbing.
"Nobody likes that kind of language," he told First Coast News. "The holocaust is a big deal. Six million people exterminated and just to say that's the same as a border policy in the United States when you're in the United Kingdom, it just doesn't make any sense."
Meanwhile, Councilmember Jimmy Peluso made a post on X saying, "It's fake outrage day in Jax!" Peluso said the mayor "answered a question truthfully" and former President Trump's "immigration plan feels like Japanese internment."
In a statement sent to First Coast News, Councilmember Matt Carlucci said he "agrees with Mayor Donna Deegan."
Referencing Trump's presidency, he said, "When Trump was president, I watched children being tragically separated from their mothers and fathers and put it in cages while Trump was president. To me this is a modern version of a concentration camp."
Following the criticism of her comments, Mayor Deegan released the following statement:
"When you flat out call a group of human being’s animals and say they are poisoning the blood of our country, then promise to round them up in detention camps, what would lead anyone to believe they'd be treated humanely? The inevitable human rights abuses that would come are un-American and go against our country's values."