Mayor Ras Baraka of Newark speaks to the press close to ICE brokers at an indication exterior an immigrant detention centre in Elizabeth, New Jersey Could 7, 2025.
Timothy A. Clary | AFP | Getty Photos
Newark Mayor Ras Baraka was arrested Friday for allegedly trespassing inside a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention middle in his metropolis, New Jersey’s interim high prosecutor stated.
Baraka “dedicated trespass and ignored a number of warnings” from Division of Homeland Safety officers who instructed him to go away the ability, alleged Alina Habba, the interim U.S. lawyer for the District of New Jersey.
“He has willingly chosen to ignore the regulation. That won’t stand on this state. He has been taken into custody,” Habba, a former protection lawyer for President Donald Trump, wrote on X.
However Rep. LaMonica McIver, D-N.J., who witnessed the arrest, countered that the mayor “did nothing incorrect.”
Baraka went inside a safety gate on the ICE facility, generally known as Delaney Corridor, and instructed officers that “he was ready for us to return out as a result of we have been conducting an oversight go to,” McIver stated in remarks to reporters after the incident.
“They requested him to go away. He left, out of the gate,” the lawmaker stated.
ICE officers “then got here out to have a huddle” and determined that Baraka “needs to be arrested nonetheless as a result of he was inside,” McIver stated.
They then arrested the mayor “who had already left off of their property from behind the gate,” she stated.
“What we see right here is despicable, and we should always all be indignant.”
Mayor Ras Baraka of Newark in handcuffs exterior Delaney Corridor detention facility in Newark, NJ on Could 9, 2025.
Courtesy: Newark Mayor’s Workplace
Baraka, 55, is a Democrat working for governor of New Jersey. His administration filed a lawsuit in late March to block the opening of the Newark immigrant detention facility, arguing that its operators didn’t acquire the right permits and violated metropolis code.
Kabir Moss, a spokesman for Baraka’s gubernatorial marketing campaign, confirmed the arrest on the facility, NBC Information reported.
Two different U.S. Home Democrats from New Jersey, Bonnie Watson Coleman and Rob Menendez, have been additionally on the detention middle on Friday.
Baraka’s workplace and marketing campaign didn’t instantly reply to CNBC’s requests for remark.
A video posted on X by News12NJ reporter Amanda Lee exhibits a bodily altercation between regulation enforcement officers and obvious protesters by a safety gate on the facility.
One other video posted by Lee seems to indicate Baraka being led away together with his arms cuffed behind his again.
A spokesperson for Watson Coleman instructed NBC that the three U.S. representatives “have been escorted in” to Delaney Corridor “after a interval of explaining the regulation to the officers on the web site.”
The members of Congress stated they have been there to conduct oversight on the ability in gentle of reporting about different ICE facilities, which have develop into political flashpoints amid Trump’s aggressive deportation efforts.
However Homeland Safety spokeswoman Tricia McLaughlin in a press release to NBC referred to as the incident “a weird political stunt” by a gaggle of protesters that included the elected officers.
The group “stormed the gate and broke into the detention facility” as a busload of detainees entered a safety gate, McLaughlin stated.
The protesters “holed up in a guard shack, the primary safety verify level,” she stated.
“Had these members requested a tour, we’d have facilitated a tour of the ability. That is an evolving state of affairs,” she added.
Watson Coleman pushed again on that characterization.
“Opposite to a press assertion put out by DHS we didn’t ‘storm’ the detention middle,” the congresswoman stated later Friday. She referred to as the DHS spokeswoman “unfamiliar with the info,” noting that her assertion incorrectly claimed there have been solely two U.S. representatives on the facility.
The mayor’s arrest was swiftly condemned by Democratic politicians and advocacy teams.
New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy stated he was “outraged” by the motion, and referred to as for Baraka’s speedy launch.
Murad Awawdeh, president of the New York Immigration Coalition, referred to as the arrest a “reckless and irresponsible” response to the elected officers’ oversight efforts.
“We demand the speedy launch of Mayor Baraka, and for these answerable for this determination to be held accountable,” Awawdeh stated.
