In huge news showing the Trump Administration is serious about not only deporting illegal aliens, but taking down the politicians who are trying to protect them from facing justice, the mayor of the New Jersey town of Newark was arrested by federal gents for trespass after he refused to leave an ICE detention center in the town.
Apparently, the mayor, who is named Ras Baraka, was protesting at the center because it is set to open this week and he doesn’t want to see immigration policy enforced in his town. So, when he refused to leave the facility in which he was trespassing on Friday, May 9, he was arrested by federal agents for that crime.
Such is what Trump aide and interim U.S. attorney for New Jersey Alina Habba announced in a post on X, saying, “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.”
Continuing, Habba noted that Mayor Baraka had chosen to disregard the law and so was arrested and taken into custody, showing the Trump Administration will hold everyone who breaks the law accountable. She said, “He has willingly chosen to disregard the law. That will not stand in this state. He has been taken into custody. NO ONE IS ABOVE THE LAW.”
According to a report from NBC New York citing witnesses to the incident, Baraka’s trespass-based arrest at the Newark ICE facility came when he “attempted to join a scheduled tour of the facility with three members of New Jersey’s congressional delegation, Reps. Robert Menendez, LaMonica McIver, and Bonnie Watson Coleman.”
However, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) told a different story in a press statement on the matter, alleging that protesters including the elected officials had stormed through the gate of the facility and into it, then “holed up” in a guard building on the premises.
The statement said, “Today, as a bus of detainees was entering the security gate of Delaney Hall 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. Representatives Robert Menendez, Jr. and Bonnie Watson Coleman and multiple protestors are holed up in a guard shack, the first security check point.”
"*" indicates required fields
Further, the DHS added that the claims about the facility being illegal are completely made up, saying, “The allegations made by Newark politicians that Delaney does not have the proper permitting are false. We have valid permits, and inspections for plumbing and electricity, and fire codes have been cleared.”
Commenting on the arrest, DHS Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin said that the absurd stunt put lives at risk, saying, “Members of Congress storming into a detention facility goes beyond a bizarre political stunt and puts the safety of our law enforcement agents and detainees at risk.”
Continuing, the Assistant Secretary added that a tour would have been acceptable, but instead they trespassed, writing, “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. This is an evolving situation.”
Watch the incident here:
Featured image credit: screengrab from the embedded video