The mayor of Newark was arrested Friday at an ICE detention facility in New Jersey where congressional leaders had scheduled an afternoon "oversight" visit.
A spokesperson confirmed Mayor Ras Baraka was taken into custody by federal police outside Delaney Hall in Newark. The spokesperson did not have additional details to provide.
Alina Habba, the interim U.S. attorney for the district of New Jersey, said Baraka "committed trespass and ignored multiple warnings from Homeland Security Investigations to remove himself from the ICE detention center."
"He has willingly chosen to disregard the law. That will not stand in this state. He has been taken into custody," a post on X read.
Baraka had visited the facility in recent days amid efforts to close the recently reopened prison. The mayor has made public claims that the detention center does not have the appropriate permits to operate.
Witnesses said the arrest came after Baraka 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.
"We’re at Delaney Hall, an ICE prison in Newark that opened without permission from the city & in violation of local ordinances," Rep. Coleman wrote in a post on X.
When federal officials blocked his entry, a heated argument broke out, according to Viri Martinez, an activist with the New Jersey Alliance for Immigrant Justice. It continued even after Baraka returned to the public side of the gates.
“The agents started intimidating and putting their hands on the congresswomen. There was yelling and pushing,” Martinez said. “Then the officers swarmed Baraka. They threw one of the organizers to the ground. They put Baraka handcuffs and put him in an unmarked car.”
Baraka, a Democrat who is running to succeed term-limited Gov. Phil Murphy, has embraced the fight with the Trump administration over illegal immigration.
He has aggressively pushed back against the construction and opening of the 1,000-bed detention center, arguing that it should not be allowed to open because of building permit issues.
The two-story building next to a county prison operated as a halfway house before a February announcement from Immigration and Customs Enforcement that it and the GEO Group reached a $1 billion, 15-year deal for a detention center there.
Baraka sued GEO Group soon after the deal was announced.
https://www.nbcnewyork.com/new-jersey/newark-mayor-ras-baraka-arrested-ice/6258503/
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