ICE agents said they “don’t care” about a judge’s order banning them from arresting immigrants at Federal Plaza. But one advocate and former elected official decided to try and make them care.
Former City Comptroller Brad Lander, now running for Congress, arrived at the Lower Manhattan facility after 9 a.m. on May 20, fuming and brandishing a copy of the stay issued by federal Judge Kevin Castel. The visit came a day after masked ICE agents arrested a Honduran immigrant in spite of Castel’s order indefinitely banning them from making arrests of immigrants attending court-ordered hearings.
For Lander, he said, slightly tongue-in-cheek, that his visit was a “know your rights exercise” for ICE agents.
“I brought a stack of the judge’s order, and I thought that if there were ICE agents in the hallways, that I would just hand it to them and we’ve been giving out know your rights materials all year, and I want to make sure you know your rights, because violating a judge’s order, violating the Constitution, would put you in very serious legal jeopardy,” Lander said. “If you would choose to violate the civil rights of the peaceful individuals who have come here for their hearing in front of a judge, and you grab and abduct them in violation of this order, you would be in very serious legal jeopardy.”
Although Lander said he was prepared to face off with masked ICE agents after they were spotted on several floors of 26 Federal Plaza and 290 Broadway a day prior, the federal immigration court was empty of ICE activity on Wednesday.
“It could start again tomorrow morning. All we know is that we did not see them here this morning,” Lander added.
Instead, the former comptroller — who was infamously arrested by ICE agents last year while advocating for immigrants attending hearings — sat in on a court hearing on Wednesday.
As for the immigrant arrested on Tuesday, his attorneys from the NewYork Legal Assistance Group said the 21-year-old man had been released hours later after filing a habeas corpus petition on his behalf. DHS responded to the detainment by claiming that the man is an “active “Bloods street gang member and had faced charges for “burglary, robbery, larceny, and possession of stolen property.” A source with knowledge of his case reported that these charges were dismissed and sealed.
Lander was not buying ICE’s claims about the man’s record.
“My reaction to that quote is that ICE lies in almost every sentence,” Lander railed. “If they are saying that this individual involved was a national security threat, or that there was some imminent risk of death, violence, or physical harm, they would not have released him last night. I’ve been in hundreds at this point of proceedings. In one of the hundreds of proceedings I’ve been in, the judge referred to a criminal record of any kind. The vast majority of people that have been detained have no criminal record, and ICE has lied about it on many cases.”
