More Than a Dozen Elected Officials Arrested While Protesting Conditions at NYC Immigration Holding Facility

[bigtree]

State Senator Julia Salazar along with other local officials demands entrance to an immigrant detention center at 26 Federal Plaza, Sept. 18, 2025. Credit: Ben Fractenberg/THE CITY

Sep 18, 2025
More than a dozen elected officials were arrested Thursday while protesting conditions at a New York City immigration holding facility where a court order is requiring the government to shape up its treatment of detainees.

watch:

The officials — including the city’s fiscal watchdog and state lawmakers — were among 77 people detained during protests at 26 Federal Plaza in Manhattan. The government building, home to immigration court, the FBI‘s New York field office and other federal offices, has become a hotbed of arrests and detention amid President Donald Trump’s crackdown on illegal immigration.

Eleven officials were arrested inside the building while attempting to inspect holding rooms on the 10th floor that are the subject of ongoing litigation alleging squalid conditions and overcrowding, according to a coalition of politicians, advocates and faith leaders involved in the protest. They were given summonses and released. The building was later locked down because of a telephoned bomb threat, authorities said.

The officials had gone to the holding facility to see if U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement was complying with a preliminary injunction issued Wednesday that requires the agency to limit capacity, ensure cleanliness and provide sleeping mats, among other remedies, the coalition said.

But federal agents barred them from entering the holding rooms and arrested them as news reporters and photographers documented the scene. The arrests happened as the officials were conducting a sit-in in the hallway, encircled around a sign showing a slash through the word “ICE.” Agents bound their hands with plastic ties, lined them up against a wall and paraded them down a hall.

https://www.seattletimes.com/nation-world/nation/elected-officials-and-dozens-of-protesters-are-arrested-at-manhattan-immigration-holding-facility/


The arrests at 26 Federal Plaza happened after an hour-long standoff, with the lawmakers refusing to leave the hallway outside the lockup, banging on the locked doors, and eventually sitting down to chant and sing before they were hauled off in zip ties. All 11 have been released.

Those arrested were city Comptroller Brad Lander along with state Senators Jabari Brisport, Gustavo Rivera and Julia Salazar and Assemblymembers Robert Carroll, Emily Gallagher, Jessica Gonzalez Rojas, Marcela Mitaynes, Steve Raga, Tony Simone and Claire Valdez.

Mitaynes, who represents Sunset Park in Brooklyn, spoke in Spanish.

“I represent an immigrant community and they’re terrified,” she said. “They’re not going out in the streets, they’re not taking their children to school, the businesses are realizing they can’t survive this.”

“Our neighbors are disappearing,” she continued. “We cannot permit this to continue.”

https://www.thecity.nyc/2025/09/18/dhs-arrests-brad-lander-democratic-lawmakers-26-federal-plaza/


Credit: Ben Fractenberg/THE CITY

[leftstreet]

1. DURec

[OldBaldy1701E]

2. But, we won't drag the biggest criminal in the government out kicking and screaming.

Got it.

Impartial justice.

[Evolve Dammit]

3. Banana Republic redux/ unreal