New York Gov. Kathy Hochul said Friday that she wants U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement disbanded and replaced by the old Immigration and Naturalization Service, accusing ICE of “wreaking havoc across America” even as she insisted New York will continue cooperating with federal authorities to remove immigrants who commit crimes.
Hochul made the remarks during an appearance on MS NOW’s “Morning Joe” while discussing newly enacted New York legislation restricting agreements that allow local law enforcement agencies to assist ICE with civil immigration enforcement.
The Democratic governor began by drawing a distinction between cooperation with federal authorities involving criminals and the use of local police officers for broader immigration enforcement.
“New York state will never be a sanctuary for criminals, full stop. We work with federal law enforcement, including ICE, when it comes to protecting New Yorkers, and that means we always have and always will work to get criminals off the streets and in the criminal justice system, get their justice, go to jail, and then go back to their home country. That’s how we do it in New York.”
Hochul then turned to agreements that some New York counties have maintained with ICE, arguing that local police resources should not be used to enforce federal civil immigration laws.
“But what we had before was, there were counties that had relationships with ICE, formal agreements, where they would actually be using local law enforcement for civil immigration enforcement. I’m not talking about criminals. I’m talking about someone who the only offense is coming into this country, and these are people with temporary protective status, maybe they had a green card, a work permit, married to an American citizen. They’re going after everybody, because they have to hit those inane Stephen Miller quotas. So, I’ve said, and we passed a law, and it went into effect just this week, you cannot have those agreements with ICE to be using local cops for doing your job, ICE. I want local cops focused on local crimes. And crime has gone down dramatically since I’ve been Governor in the state of New York for the last five years, and it’s because I’ve invested money in law enforcement. We’re building trust between communities and law enforcement.”
The governor argued that assigning local officers to immigration enforcement can divert them from responding to violent crime and other public-safety needs in their own communities.
Hochul then escalated her criticism of ICE itself, saying the massive federal agency should be capable of carrying out immigration enforcement without relying on local police departments.
“It has nothing to do with having our local police diverted from catching the rapists, catching the murderers, responding to an emergency, and doing ICE’s job for them. It’s an $85 billion agency. I think they can take care of themselves. In fact, I wish they would just disband and go back to the old Immigration and Naturalization Service. Remember old INS? People trusted them. They did their jobs. This is a rogue policing state that is wreaking havoc across America. In New York, we say, no more.”
The INS, which Hochul invoked as her preferred model, ceased to exist in 2003 when its immigration responsibilities were divided among agencies within the newly created Department of Homeland Security, including ICE.
Hochul’s comments came as immigration enforcement remains a major point of confrontation between Democratic-led states and the Trump administration, which has pursued an aggressive nationwide campaign to identify, detain and deport illegal immigrants.
The New York governor’s newly signed legislation places the state squarely in that battle by barring local law enforcement agencies from entering certain agreements under which their officers perform immigration-related functions on behalf of ICE.
At the same time, Hochul sought to reject the characterization that her policy would protect immigrants who commit serious crimes, repeatedly emphasizing that New York authorities will continue working with federal law enforcement in criminal cases.
Her broader condemnation of ICE, however, went considerably further than criticism of individual enforcement tactics. Hochul said she wants the agency itself eliminated, arguing that the country should return to an immigration enforcement structure resembling the system that existed before ICE was created more than two decades ago.
{Matzav.com}
