BRIARCLIFF MANOR - A New Jersey attorney is asking the authorities to investigate President Trump after a dozen employees who were in the country illegally were fired from a Trump-owned Westchester golf club on Jan. 18.

Anibal Romero, who is also representing former employees at the golf course in Bedminster, New Jersey, said managers at the Trump National Golf Club had known about the workers' legal status for years, according to an Associated Press story. Many of the workers had been employees for over a decade.

"Donald Trump, his people and his companies have been abusing the law through coercion, procurement of false documents and, in some cases, physical abuse," Romero said Sunday in a written statement to The Journal News. "The Trump operation is a criminal enterprise that knowingly broke the law. The workers have done nothing wrong but work hard while the club can break the law with impunity."

The firings came in the middle of a 35-day government shutdown over border security and funding for a wall that Trump wants built on the southern border of the country. Trump has repeatedly said immigrants in the country illegally take jobs from American citizens and bring drugs and crime over the border.

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Romero is calling on the authorities to investigate Trump's businesses and holdings.

"We see a hypocrite-in-chief who shutdown the government over undocumented immigrants, when the fact is that he has lured his own private caravan of undocumented workers to Bedminster, Westchester and probably every other club he owns," he said.

The Trump Organization, which is managed by the president's sons, Eric and Donald Trump Jr., did not immediately respond to messages seeking comment.

"Wake up America," Romero said. "It is time to rally around the brave women and men who have come forward out of the shadows and have stood up to the most powerful man on earth – at great personal risk to themselves and their families."

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Twitter: @ReporterRox