Alina Habba, the interim U.S. attorney for the District of New Jersey, announced Monday she is charging Rep. LaMonica McIver (D-N.J.) with assaulting law enforcement while at an U.S. Immigrations and Customs Enforcement (ICE) detention center in Newark earlier this month.
It marks the first time that President Trump’s Justice Department has criminally charged a sitting lawmaker during his second term, a major escalation stemming from when McIver tried to gain access to the Delaney Hall ICE detention center along with two other New Jersey Democrats and Newark Mayor Ras Baraka (D) earlier this month.
Habba’s office previously charged Baraka with a misdemeanor trespassing charge. She simultaneously announced on Monday that his charge would be dropped “for the sake of moving forward.”
But Habba said McIver’s conduct “cannot be overlooked” and accused the congresswoman of the federal crime of assaulting, resisting and impeding law enforcement.
“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,” Habba said in a statement.
Information about the charges was not immediately available in the court’s online system.
In a statement, McIver condemned the charges and said she was performing her “lawful oversight responsibilities.”
“The charges against me are purely political — they mischaracterize and distort my actions, and are meant to criminalize and deter legislative oversight,” she wrote.
McIver had also previously contested accusations she was violent that day, including claims from the Department of Homeland Security that she had “body slammed” ICE officials.
“Absolutely no. I mean, I honestly do not know how to body slam anyone. There’s no video that supports me body- slamming anyone,” McIver said during an interview with CNN.
Trump named Habba as New Jersey’s top federal prosecutor in March after she served a stint as counselor to the president within the White House. She previously worked as one of Trump’s most personal defense attorneys, gaining national prominence through frequent television appearances in which she decried “lawfare” against the then-former president.
The charges were immediately blasted by Democrats on the House Judiciary Committee.
“The targeting of Representative McIver is a blatant attempt to intimidate Members of Congress and to block our oversight of this administration’s actions, which have been enjoined more than 150 times by federal courts. We stand by Representative McIver’s exercise of her constitutional rights and duties. If you come for the legal rights of one of us, you come for the rights of all of us,” numerous Democrats on the panel said in a statement spearheaded by ranking member Jamie Raskin (D-Md.).
“Charging Members of Congress for doing our jobs is a dangerous precedent to set. It reveals the increasingly authoritarian nature of this Administration and its relentless, illegal attempts to suppress any dissent or oversight, including from judges, Members of Congress, and the American people, which check lawless executive power. Representative McIver has our full support, and we will do everything in our power to help fight this outrageous threat to our constitutional system.”
Lawmakers have the legal right to tour ICE facilities at any time without seeking prior approval from the agency.
Beyond the oversight role McIver and the other Democrats there say they were fulfilling, lawmakers are typically protected from prosecution for actions they take in their official capacity under the Speech and Debate clause of the constitution, which protects lawmakers from being “questioned” outside the halls of Congress. Still, lawmakers are not immune from prosecution for criminal acts.
Video footage from the scuffle erupted between lawmakers and ICE personnel earlier this month makes it difficult to get a clear picture of what transpired.
In one clip of the fracas shared by NJ Spotlight News, McIver could be heard telling officers not to touch her or Rep. Bonnie Watson Coleman (D-N.J.) as McIver appeared to cling to the elder congresswoman. McIver seemed to push back against a police officer as the lawmakers were crowded, separating the pair.
“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,” McIver said in her statement.
Democratic lawmakers had previously asked why charges were even being considered by the Trump administration.
“My question is, if they were so bad, why were they allowed to go in after to conduct oversight?” Rep. Delia Ramirez (D-Ill.) asked Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem last week.
Updated at 9:51 p.m. EDT
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