The U.S. Attorney for New Jersey announced charges against Rep. LaMonica McIver of New Jersey on May 19 for assaulting, impeding, and interfering with law enforcement related to an altercation at a Newark immigration facility.
Three Democratic lawmakers from New Jersey − Reps. Bonnie Watson Coleman, Rob Menendez, and McIver − faced off against DHS guards on May 9 outside the Delaney Hall detention center shortly after officers arrested Newark Mayor Ras Baraka. Members of Congress, by law, can visit immigrant detention facilities unannounced.
Interim U.S. Attorney Alina Habba, formerly a lawyer for President Donald Trump, said in a statement that “I have persistently made efforts to address these issues without bringing criminal charges and have given Representative McIver every opportunity to come to a resolution, but she has unfortunately declined.”
In a statement, McIver called the charges political. The other two lawmakers have not been charged.
“We were fulfilling our lawful oversight responsibilities, as members of Congress have done many times before, and our visit should have been peaceful and short. Instead, ICE agents created an unnecessary and unsafe confrontation when they chose to arrest Mayor Baraka,” she said. “The charges against me are purely political — they mischaracterize and distort my actions and are meant to criminalize and deter legislative oversight.”
Department of Homeland Security spokeswoman Tricia McLaughlin initially told CNN that multiple members of Congress had assaulted officers and that arrests were possible.
“We actually have body camera footage of these members of Congress assaulting these ICE enforcement officers, including body slamming a female ICE officer,” she claimed.
The members of Congress have pushed back on the government’s narrative that they assaulted officers. Body camera footage shows the representatives objecting to Baraka’s request and to officers physically touching the members of Congress as a small, tight packed group moves along a fence.
After the incident, the members of Congress took an hour-long tour of the facility.
“They didn’t assault anyone, but were themselves aggressively mistreated by illegally masked individuals,” House Democratic leaders said in a joint statement. “There is no credible evidence that Rep. McIver engaged in any criminal activity, and she would not have been permitted to tour the facility had she done anything wrong.”
In the statement, the leaders called the charges an attempt by the Trump administration to intimidate Congress.
“Everyone responsible for this illegitimate abuse of power is going to be held accountable for their actions. An attack on one of us is an attack on the American people. House Democrats will respond vigorously in the days to come at a time, place and manner of our choosing,” the statement said.
Senior Justice Department officials voiced support for the highly unusual decision to charge a sitting member of Congress with assaulting an officer.
“I echo what [Habba] has made clear: assaults on federal law enforcement will not be tolerated,” Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche, another former Trump attorney, wrote on X. “This Administration will always protect those who work tirelessly to keep America safe.”
In the same May 19 statement, Habba said the misdemeanor trespassing charge against Baraka, a candidate for governor, has been dropped “for the sake of moving forward.”
The American Civil Liberties Union in New Jersey on Monday lambasted the charges.
“The Trump administration’s political charges against Congresswoman McIver is a method more suited for authoritarianism than American democracy,” Mike Zamore, national director of policy and government affairs at the ACLU, and Amol Sinha, executive director of ACLU-NJ, said in a statement.
“If the Trump administration can target elected officials who oppose its extreme agenda, it can happen to any one of us. We demand that they drop the charges against Rep. McIver, and we implore her fellow members of Congress to call for the same.”
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: US attorney charges congresswoman after Newark ICE facility visit
