Department of Homeland Security (DHS) said House Democrats could be arrested after a Friday visit to Delaney Hall, a New Jersey detention center for Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).
Three Democratic New Jersey members of Congress- Bonnie Watson Coleman (D), Rob Menendez (D) and LaMonica McIver (D) — tried to get access to the Delaney Hall ICE detention center along with Newark Mayor Ras Baraka (D), who was arrested for trespassing, causing shock and outrage from fellow party members.
“There were multiple people arrested, and Victor, I think that we should let viewers know there will likely be more arrests coming,” DHS spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin said during a Friday CNN appearance, highlighted by Mediaite.
“We actually have body camera footage of some of these members of Congress assaulting our ICE enforcement officers, including body slamming a female ICE officer, so we will be showing that to viewers very shortly,” she added.
When pressed by CNN anchor Victor Blackwell if the members of Congress involved could be arrested, McLaughlin responded, “This is an ongoing investigation and that it definitely on the table.”
ICE officials said Coleman, Menendez and LaMonica McIver were pushing and shoving among the people in the crowd outside the facility.
However, Coleman said reports about lawmakers’ rowdy presence are not true.
“Since DHS has been lying about this, allow me to correct the record. This scuffle, during which an ICE agent physically shoved me, occurred AFTER we had entered the Delaney Hall premises. We entered the facility, came BACK OUT to speak to the Mayor, and then ICE agents began shoving us,” Coleman wrote in a Friday post on X.
“This is not how we entered the facility. We were escorted in by guards, because we have lawful oversight authority to be there,” she added.
The New Jersey representative said members of Congress have the legal right to conduct oversight at DHS facilities without prior notice and noted she’s conducted visits twice this year.
“The notion that I or any of my colleagues ‘body slammed’ armed federal officers is absurd. DHS is lying because they know their agents were out of line,” Coleman said in a statement.
“They have to resort to lies because their conduct is indefensible on the merits. They can threaten us all they like, but their lies are still lies. We will not be intimidated,” she continued.
The Trump administration has actively threatened to pull federal funding from sanctuary cities that do not require law enforcement to cooperate with federal immigration authorities despite a judge’s ruling blocking the effort.
The Delaney Hall facility in New Jersey is set to propel President Trump’s agenda to carry out the largest deportation in the country’s history.
The 1,000-bed New Jersey detention center will reopen under a $1 billion contract with management from the GEO Group, a private global lender that runs several prisons across the country.
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