NEW YORK (BN24) — More than a dozen Democratic elected officials were arrested Thursday during demonstrations at a federal building in Manhattan, where U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement operates holding cells that a judge recently ruled were in violation of basic human rights standards.
New York City Comptroller Brad Lander and 10 state lawmakers were taken into custody inside 26 Federal Plaza after they were blocked from entering the 10th-floor detention unit, according to protest organizers. The group said they were attempting to “ensure compliance” with a federal court order issued a day earlier that demanded improvements to what the judge called “inhumane” conditions inside the lockup.
At the same time, New York City Public Advocate Jumaane Williams led dozens of demonstrators outside the building, where protesters sat across the garage entrance with signs and chanted, “Say it loud, say it clear, immigrants are welcome here.” Organizers estimated that more than 75 people were detained between the two protest actions.
Tricia McLaughlin, assistant secretary for the Department of Homeland Security, placed the overall number of arrests at 71. She said Lander and the other officials disrupted law enforcement activity and refused to leave until detainees were released, forcing police and federal agents to make arrests. The building was temporarily placed on lockdown after authorities said a bomb threat was called in.
The clash marked the latest confrontation between federal authorities and Democratic leaders opposing President Donald Trump’s immigration policies. Lander had been detained at the same building in June while escorting a man targeted for deportation. In May, U.S. Rep. LaMonica McIver, D-N.J., and Newark Mayor Ras Baraka were arrested during a confrontation outside a New Jersey immigration facility.
Thursday’s protest came less than 24 hours after a federal judge issued an 84-page injunction describing overcrowded and unsanitary conditions at the Manhattan ICE lockup. The court cited detainees being packed shoulder-to-shoulder — as many as 90 people in a 215-square-foot room — forced to sleep on concrete floors, and denied showers, soap, sanitary products, clean clothing, or toilet paper.
“The cruel policy of subjecting individuals to degrading treatment and inhumane conditions is deeply disturbing. And now the court has made it abundantly clear that it is also illegal,” said Harold Solis, co-legal director of the advocacy group Make the Road New York.
DHS officials, however, said the detainees at 26 Federal Plaza included immigrants convicted of crimes such as drug trafficking, weapons offenses, and even one man arrested for repeatedly flying drones near the White House.
The New York Police Department confirmed multiple arrests but did not say whether formal charges had been filed. Neither ICE nor DHS commented on potential prosecutions.
The arrests underline the growing tension between Democratic leaders in New York and the Trump administration over the treatment of migrants and the future of immigration enforcement in the United States.
