Rep. Dan Goldman (D-Brooklyn/Manhattan) pulled no punches throughout an emergency press convention Thursday afternoon after witnessing a gaggle of masked, plainclothes Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) brokers detaining immigrants at routine courtroom appearances Thursday morning.
“This is Gestapo-like behavior, where plainclothes officers wearing masks are terrorizing immigrants who are doing the right thing by going to court, following up on their immigration proceedings, and trying to come into this country lawfully,” Goldman stated on the convention, evaluating the seizures to the conduct of Nazi Germany’s notorious secret police power.
“These are routine appearances, they’re updates, they’re administrative, there is no reason for anyone to have expected anything unusual to happen today, and yet they’re ripped away from their families, from their communities,” the Congress member added.
Goldman made the remarks exterior the New York Government Workplace for Immigration Overview at 290 Broadway in Decrease Manhattan when ICE brokers disrupted immigration appointments and took at the very least two people into custody, he stated on the Thursday convention.
A protester holds an indication towards Secretary of State Marco Rubio and ICE deportations throughout a press convention in Manhattan on Could 29, 2025.Picture by Lloyd Mitchell
The incident comes amid a string of ICE detentions at New York immigration courts, which have seen masked, plainclothes ICE brokers taking people attending immigration appointments into custody. On Wednesday, ICE detained a number of people attending immigration appointments, in addition to onlookers and a Queens pastor, in line with a report from THE CITY, inside 26 Federal Plaza in Decrease Manhattan. A number of employees members of US Rep. Jerry Nadler had been additionally arrested in the course of the operation.
Brokers final week arrested an NYC public college pupil at an immigration listening to, which Mayor Eric Adams has insisted is a federal matter over which the town has no management. The scholar’s detention has sparked outrage throughout the town and nation over ICE’s techniques.
In February, Goldman helped introduce laws that will block ICE from getting into “sensitive locations” together with medical services, colleges, locations of worship, courthouses, and DMV workplaces.
Who’re these masked males?
Plenty of ICE brokers had been masked, and Goldman requested two of them Thursday why that they had hid their faces. Certainly one of them allegedly advised Goldman, “Because it’s cold.”
“I asked him if he would testify to that under oath, and he walked away and wouldn’t respond to me,” Goldman stated.
One other agent, Goldman stated, “admitted that they’re wearing masks so that they are not caught on video.”
“My question to them is: If what you are doing is legitimate, is lawful, is totally above board, why do you need to cover your face? Law enforcement officers do not cover their face,” Goldman stated.
Goldman criticized the Trump administration for what he recognized as a double normal utilized to masking for the needs of concealing one’s identification.
“In fact, the Trump administration is cracking down on universities for allowing protesters to wear masks. So apparently it is not okay to wear a mask if you are protesting the government, but it is okay if you are the government to wear masks in order to shield your face from the public,” Goldman stated. “This is not America. This is not who we are.”
ICE raids ‘hits especially home’
The Trump administration has delivered calls for to a number of universities, together with Columbia and Harvard, over what the federal authorities has recognized as a failure to successfully fight antisemitism on faculty campuses. Columbia partially ceded to a number of of Trump’s calls for, implementing a partial ban on masks worn for the aim of concealing identification. The administration is now attempting to ban Harvard from enrolling worldwide college students.
Goldman, who’s Jewish, stated the incident “hits especially home” for him, as his grandmother escaped antisemitism in Ukraine and got here to the USA by means of Ellis Island.
“I’m also, as a Jew, very familiar with the Gestapo in Nazi Germany, and other forms of secret law enforcement in Russia and elsewhere, that used fear and intimidation under the cover of night, under the cover of masks, in order to terrorize people that they did not like,” Goldman stated.
Whereas he witnessed two arrests Thursday morning, the Congress member stated his employees has been monitoring comparable incidents all week and has seen “many more.”
The arrests, Goldman stated, will solely discourage folks from attending their necessary, routine immigration appointments and “encourage people to avoid the legal system, to avoid following proper procedures.”
“By doing that, you are creating more danger, more public safety issues, because there’s less accountability and there’s less legitimacy to the proceedings,” Goldman stated.
Goldman, who sits on the Home Committee on Homeland Safety, stated the Trump administration is deceptive the general public in regards to the aim of mass deportations.
“Ultimately, what this comes down to is not anything having to do with the border, it is not anything having to do with our immigration system,” Goldman stated. “It is simply an effort by the Trump administration to remove as many foreigners as possible from this country so that they can return to the 1950s under this Great Replacement Theory and go back to a world of white supremacism that does not include immigrants trying to come to this country to seek a better life.”
Responding to a query about federal companies “conspiring” in ICE arrests at courthouses, Goldman stated the tactic is “clearly a coordinated effort between the Homeland Security lawyers and ICE.” One of many brokers Goldman spoke to Thursday morning, Goldman stated, was an FBI agent.
“Apparently, the headquarters of the FBI has directed agents as part of the FBI to join these operations to support ICE officials,” Goldman stated. “So when you talk about a coordinated effort, it’s bigger than just the Department of Homeland Security, it’s also the FBI.”
Goldman stated he’s returning to Washington subsequent week and can “aggressively demand answers from the Department of Homeland Security” in regards to the ICE detention tactic.
“The Trump administration has been entirely nonresponsive to Democrats’ requests, but we’re gonna keep making them, because we represent the American people, and I am certain the American people want answers to those questions,” Goldman stated.
