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Hackensack Mayor, Deputy Mayor Change Party Over Trump Comments

HACKENSACK, N.J. (CBSNewYork/AP) -- Two Republican officials in New Jersey switched political parties over what they said are racist comments made by presumptive GOP presidential nominee Donald Trump.

Hackensack Mayor John Labrosse and Deputy Mayor Kathleen Canestrino filed a change of party affiliation to independents on Thursday with the Bergen County Board of Elections, they announced in a news release.

"The divisive and racist statements that Trump keeps making are insulting to many of our people and completely unacceptable. We don't want a young student in one of our schools hearing these things and believing that their own elected officials are supporting these types of statements,'' the pair said in a statement.

Census figures show about 17,000 of the city's nearly 44,000 residents in 2014 were foreign-born. Nearly 13,000 spoke Spanish at home, according to the data.

"We felt at this time, the best thing for us to do is to make a statement so that the citizens of our town are aware that we support  the diversity in our community," Canestrino told 1010 WINS.

Labrosse and Canestrino said there was not a specific comment that influenced their decision. They say it was the general tone of the campaign.

"And hearing these types of comments, it was really offensive to both of us," Canestrino told WCBS 880's Marla Diamond.

Their decision to switch party affiliations came after the state's top Republican, Gov. Chris Christie, refused to criticize Trump's comments about an American-born federal judge of Mexican heritage and said that the presumptive Republican presidential nominee is not a racist.

"Those are Donald's opinions and he has the right to express them, the same way anybody else has the right to express their views regarding how they're treated in the civil or criminal courts in this country,'' Christie said.

Trump said that U.S. District Judge Gonzalo Curiel cannot judge him fairly in lawsuits against Trump University because he is of Mexican heritage and Trump has pledged to build a wall with Mexico. Trump later said in a statement that his comments were "misconstrued'' as an attack against people of Mexican heritage.

While filling in for Boomer Esiason during the Boomer & Carton Show Thursday morning, the governor also chimed in on elected Republicans who complain about Trump or have pulled their support.

"All these guys — governors, senators — they all sat on the sidelines. I went and asked these people for their support and they said, 'let's see how it plays out.' Now they don't like how it played out and they say 'well, what are we going to do?' What are we going to do? Millions of people voted. It is still a democracy and the fact is, the voters of our party and the voters of the Democratic Party have a right to pick who they want to pick," he said.

Even though Labrosse and Canestrino were registered Republicans, Hackensack selects council members in a nonpartisan election.

(TM and © Copyright 2016 CBS Radio Inc. and its relevant subsidiaries. CBS RADIO and EYE Logo TM and Copyright 2016 CBS Broadcasting Inc. Used under license. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. The Associated Press contributed to this report.)

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