The federal officer who arrested the mayor of New Jersey’s largest city outside an immigration detention center in May suggested that he was making the arrest at the direction of the Justice Department’s No. 2 official, Todd Blanche, according to law enforcement body camera footage described in a new court filing.
The filing, from Rep. LaMonica McIver (D-N.J.), sheds new light on the chaotic scene on May 9 when Democratic lawmakers and Newark Mayor Ras Baraka, attempting to conduct an oversight visit, clashed with immigration agents. Baraka was arrested for trespassing, but that charge was dropped. McIver was later charged with assaulting federal agents; she is seeking to get the case dismissed.
According to McIver’s attorneys, a Department of Homeland Security special agent was on the phone as the events unfolded that day. Citing bodycam footage they obtained in the case, the attorneys wrote that the special agent, after hanging up the call, turned to a group of fellow agents and announced: “We are arresting the mayor right now, per the deputy attorney general of the United States. Anyone that gets in our way, I need you guys to give me a perimeter so I can cuff him.”
POLITICO has not reviewed the bodycam video. Although the footage was submitted as an exhibit in the case, it was not yet publicly available. A spokesperson for the Justice Department did not respond to requests for comment, and a response from the Department of Homeland Security did not address whether Blanche had ordered the agents to make the arrest.
The special agent’s apparent suggestion that he was acting at Blanche’s direction is the latest sign that top Justice Department officials are harnessing the power of law enforcement against Democrats and other perceived enemies of President Donald Trump. Trump’s DOJ has opened investigations into various figures Trump disdains, including Jack Smith, James Comey, former Homeland Security aides who criticized him and many others.
Federal law enforcement officials have also detained New York City Comptroller Brad Lander and handcuffed California Sen. Alex Padilla.
For months, Democrats have wondered if agents at the Newark immigration detention center had been instructed by a superior to arrest Baraka. Witness accounts and other video footage taken that day showed the mayor had been allowed inside a gated area by a guard, stood there peacefully for the better part of an hour and left the gated area when federal agents threatened him with arrest. That day, Rep. Rob Menendez (D-N.J.) told POLITICO that he’d witnessed an agent inside the gated area talking on the phone with someone who told the agent to arrest Baraka, who by the time of the call was outside the gate. McIver gave a similar account in a press conference at the time.
The description of the bodycam footage submitted in court last week by McIver’s attorneys bolsters that account. Quoting from the footage, her attorneys wrote that the special agent on the phone said of Baraka during the call: “Even though he stepped out, I am going to put him in cuffs.”
Then the agent made the comment about arresting the mayor “per the deputy attorney general.” Moments later, law enforcement officials came out of the gate and arrested Baraka, setting off a scrum involving the mayor and members of Congress. McIver is accused in a three-count indictment of slamming the special agent with her forearm, “forcibly” grabbing him and using her forearms to strike another agent. She has pleaded not guilty.
Less than two weeks later, federal prosecutors dropped a trespassing charge against Baraka. But a federal judge chided the effort to charge him in the first place. Magistrate Judge André M. Espinosa called it an “embarrassing retraction” that “suggests a failure to adequately investigate, to carefully gather facts and to thoughtfully consider the implications of your actions before wielding your immense power.”
Baraka is the progressive mayor of New Jersey’s largest city and at the time of his arrest was seeking the Democratic nomination for governor, an election he has since lost. Separately, he is suing the Trump administration for “malicious prosecution” in a lawsuit that names acting U.S. Attorney Alina Habba and Ricky Patel, a special agent in charge for Homeland Security Investigations’ Newark Division.
According to a comparison of court documents filed in the Baraka and McIver cases, Patel is the special agent overheard on the bodycam footage referring to the deputy attorney general.
McIver tries to harness Trump immunity ruling
The new revelations about the episode came in legal briefs asking to have McIver’s own case thrown out.
As part of that effort, McIver asked the judge overseeing the case, U.S. District Judge Jamel Semper, to rule that lawmakers have the same kind of immunity from prosecutions that the Supreme Court gave Trump.
Her attorneys said McIver’s visit to the detention facility, known as Delaney Hall, was a legislative act she cannot be prosecuted for. They cited the Supreme Court ruling last summer that gave Trump immunity from criminal prosecution for some actions he took during his first presidential term while fighting to subvert the 2020 election.
McIver’s attorneys also argued that she is facing intimidation and that Habba’s office, which is prosecuting the case, is undermining the Constitution’s “Speech or Debate” Clause. That clause grants members of Congress a form of immunity that is mostly impenetrable in investigations relating to the official duties of lawmakers, their aides or other congressional officials.
The Department of Homeland Security said the argument is laughable.
“Suggesting that physically assaulting a federal law enforcement officer is ‘legitimate legislative activity’ covered by legislative immunity makes a joke of all three branches of government at once,” the Homeland Security Department’s assistant secretary, Tricia McLaughlin, said in a statement.
If lawmakers don’t continue to receive such protections, McIver’s legal team warns of dire consequences for the country.
“If these charges are allowed to move forward, they will send a chilling message to Congress on the risk it takes when it scrutinizes the Administration’s activities,” McIver’s defense team wrote. “The Speech or Debate Clause was designed to prevent that kind of message and intimidation.”
Former Sen. Bob Menendez — Rob Menendez’s father — has tried to use the speech or debate clause to shield himself from corruption charges. He is now serving an 11-year prison sentence and appealing the conviction. McIver’s attorneys cited a 3rd Circuit ruling against Menendez in 2016 — who was then facing different corruption charges that were later dropped — as making clear that members of Congress do have immunity for legislative actions but that the allegations against him were for things beyond the scope of that immunity. McIver’s team argued the Menendez case “could not be more different” from hers.
In another legal filing made last week, McIver also sought to dismiss the charges against her based on unconstitutional “selective” and “vindictive” prosecution, noting that the Justice Department walked away from prosecutions of hundreds of defendants from Jan. 6, 2021, despite clear video of many attacking police officers.
