> “The Mayor of Newark, Ras Baraka, committed trespass and ignored multiple warnings from Homeland Security Investigations to remove himself from the ICE detention center in Newark, New Jersey this afternoon,” Alina Habba, the Interim U.S. Attorney for the District of New Jersey, posted on X.
Let's ignore that Baraka did in fact listen to the warnings.
> “The ICE personnel came out aggressively to arrest him and grab him,” said Julie Moreno, a New Jersey state captain of American Families United. “It didn’t make any sense why they chose that moment to grab him while he was outside the gates.”
I can entertain the notion that Ras Baraka may have committed illegal trespass by wrongly passing a front gate for some number of minutes, but getting a warning and listening to it surely is a normal and sufficient remedy.
> The Department of Homeland Security said in a statement that as a bus of detainees was entering the detention center, “a group of protestors, including two members of the U.S. House of Representatives, stormed the gate and broke into the detention facility.”
> Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin was quoted in the statement as calling it “beyond a bizarre political stunt” and saying it put agents’ and detainees’ safety at risk.
> “Members of Congress are not above the law and cannot illegally break into detention facilities. Had these members requested a tour, we would have facilitated a tour of the facility,” McLaughlin said.
No one broke into the facility. The mayor (probably?) trespassed. The members of Congress had permission to go in [1]:
> Watson Coleman's office told Axios they "arrived at Delaney Hall today at about 1PM to exercise their oversight authority as prescribed by law. After a period of explaining the law to the officials at the site they were escorted in."
If I give the DHS's framings some charity, I would appreciate if Assistant Secretary McLaughlin (and everyone above her) were to apply the same standards of "beyond a bizarre political stunt", `put safety at risk`, and "illegally break into" to January 6th, 2021.
hn_acker•9mo ago
Let's ignore that Baraka did in fact listen to the warnings.
> “The ICE personnel came out aggressively to arrest him and grab him,” said Julie Moreno, a New Jersey state captain of American Families United. “It didn’t make any sense why they chose that moment to grab him while he was outside the gates.”
I can entertain the notion that Ras Baraka may have committed illegal trespass by wrongly passing a front gate for some number of minutes, but getting a warning and listening to it surely is a normal and sufficient remedy.
> The Department of Homeland Security said in a statement that as a bus of detainees was entering the detention center, “a group of protestors, including two members of the U.S. House of Representatives, stormed the gate and broke into the detention facility.”
> Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin was quoted in the statement as calling it “beyond a bizarre political stunt” and saying it put agents’ and detainees’ safety at risk.
> “Members of Congress are not above the law and cannot illegally break into detention facilities. Had these members requested a tour, we would have facilitated a tour of the facility,” McLaughlin said.
No one broke into the facility. The mayor (probably?) trespassed. The members of Congress had permission to go in [1]:
> Watson Coleman's office told Axios they "arrived at Delaney Hall today at about 1PM to exercise their oversight authority as prescribed by law. After a period of explaining the law to the officials at the site they were escorted in."
If I give the DHS's framings some charity, I would appreciate if Assistant Secretary McLaughlin (and everyone above her) were to apply the same standards of "beyond a bizarre political stunt", `put safety at risk`, and "illegally break into" to January 6th, 2021.
[1] https://www.axios.com/2025/05/09/newark-ice-facility-ras-bar...