by Dana DiFilippo, New Jersey Monitor
The U.S. government sued Newark, Jersey City, Paterson, and Hoboken and their elected officials for city policies prosecutors say interfere with the Trump administration’s immigration detention and deportation goals.
Prosecutors want a judge to declare the policies an unconstitutional violation of the Constitution’s supremacy clause, which holds that federal law prevails over state law. They also want an injunction to block the cities from protecting their residents and visitors from immigration enforcement.
“The United States is currently facing a crisis of illegal immigration, and the Federal Government is set to put a stop to it,” the lawsuit states. “While states and local governments are free to stand aside as the United States performs this important work, they cannot stand in the way. And where inaction crosses into obstruction, local governments break federal law. That is what is happening across New Jersey right now. It is past time it ends.”
The complaint, filed Thursday, names as defendants Newark Mayor Ras Baraka, Jersey City Mayor Steve Fulop, Paterson Mayor Andre Sayegh, Hoboken Mayor Ravi Bhalla, and the cities’ council presidents (all four mayors are Democrats).
Baraka and Fulop are among six Democrats running to become New Jersey’s next governor, and Baraka just two days ago beat another federal case against him over a contested immigration jail that recently opened in Newark.
Baraka blasted the latest prosecution as “absurd.”
“We are not standing in the way of public safety. We are upholding the Constitution, providing oversight, and following the laws and guidelines of the State of New Jersey,” he said in a statement. “Nothing in our policies prevents law enforcement from doing their jobs. What we refuse to do is turn our city into an arm of federal immigration enforcement, which the courts have already ruled is not our role.”
Fulop said he would not be “bullied” and vowed to fight the feds.
“Jersey City gets sued for being a sanctuary city — I guess MAGA ran out of conspiracy theories for the week,” he said. “Here is the truth: Jersey City’s policies protect families, reflect our values and have led to record low crime rates.”
And Sayegh dismissed the complaint as “a frivolous lawsuit and a flagrant affront to the rule of law.”
“We will not be intimidated, and we will fight this egregious attempt to score political points at Paterson’s expense,” Sayegh said.
Bhalla also said his city “will not back down.”
“The Trump administration’s treatment of immigrants, lawful residents, and countless citizens is truly disgraceful and often, unconstitutional. Families have been senselessly torn apart, and legal residents who have not been proven to have committed any crimes have been deported to jails overseas without due process. These actions of the federal government are truly barbaric, and Hoboken will not aid this lawlessness,” he said.
In the 24-page complaint, U.S. Justice Department prosecutors led by Yaakov M. Roth, acting assistant attorney general, accused the cities of denying federal immigration agents access to undocumented people in local jails, forbidding local police from delivering them to federal immigration agents, and barring “otherwise willing local officers from providing mission-critical information to federal immigration authorities.”
Prosecutors cite executive orders and police directives that the cities issued in 2017, 2018 and 2019 during President Trump’s first term, but that remain in effect. Such policies prohibit “even the most basic cooperation with federal officials” and undermine immigration enforcement work, prosecutors argue.
“These efforts to shield illegal aliens within the Garden State are unlawful,” the complaint states.
The complaint also accuses city officials of discrimination, because they bar local police and municipal officials from cooperating only with federal immigration agents, not any other entity. Singling out one agency for unfavorable treatment constitutes discrimination, the lawsuit says.
“Such discriminatory targeting of the Federal Government is unlawful,” the complaint says.
The complaint comes three weeks after federal authorities began detaining undocumented people at Delaney Hall, a 1,100-bed jail in Newark that has drawn protesters daily.
Jail officials initially had barred city officials from inspecting the facility, which led to Baraka’s arrest earlier this month when he visited the site seeking entry. Prosecutors on Monday dropped charges against Baraka but then charged Rep. LaMonica McIver (D-10) with assaulting officers by acting as a human shield to protect Baraka from arrest. She denies the charges, and Congressional Democrats from around the country have denounced that arrest.
Immigration advocates decried the lawsuit filed Friday as the feds’ attempt strong-arm local governments into carrying out federal immigration enforcement.
Amy Torres, executive director of the New Jersey Alliance for Immigrant Justice, said the cities’ policies don’t violate federal law but instead “reflect a clear separation between local and federal responsibilities.” She urged the cities to resist caving to federal “bullying.”
“Over the last few months, the Trump Administration’s DOJ has made it clear that they want to make an example out of New Jersey — first by raiding our cities, then by expanding ICE jails in defiance of local law, and most recently by arresting elected officials and charging sitting members of Congress with felonies,” Torres said in a statement. “It is clear that the DOJ remains hellbent on making a national example out of New Jersey. In return, NJAIJ calls upon the cities of Newark, Jersey City, Paterson, and Hoboken to be a national example of resistance, dissent, and champions for justice.”