Democrats involved in tense encounter at ICE facility say Trump administration is trying to intimidate them

[BumRushDaShow]

Source: CNN Politics

Published 11:48 AM EDT, Sun May 11, 2025


CNN — Three Democratic lawmakers who were involved in a tense encounter outside an Immigrations and Customs Enforcement facility in Newark, New Jersey, are accusing the administration of “intimidation” after a Department of Homeland Security official suggested they could be arrested.

Rep. Bonnie Watson Coleman, who joined CNN’s “State of the Union” Sunday alongside fellow New Jersey Democrats, Reps. LaMonica McIver and Robert Menendez Jr., said the lawmakers haven’t heard from DHS after the tense encounter on Friday that culminated in the detention of Newark Mayor Ras Baraka. “We have no idea what they have in mind, other than to create an environment of intimidation just by claiming that perhaps we might be subject to arrest,” Watson Coleman said. “Nothing happened other than the chaos that they created themselves.”

The lawmakers traveled for a tour of the facility as part of their Congressional oversight duties and had been there for nearly two hours before the confrontation as ICE officials gave them “the run around,” Watson Coleman said. But the situation escalated when Baraka was asked to leave the premises and was detained. He was released after several hours. The immigration officials eventually took the lawmakers on the tour after the confrontation, McIver said.

“They took us on a tour, offered us a soda in the midst of doing this, never apologized or said anything about the confrontation and the chaos that they caused outside,” McIver said, adding that the lawmakers were able to speak to detainees while inside. Lawmakers are allowed to enter “any facility operated by or for the Department of Homeland Security used to detain or otherwise house aliens” to conduct oversight under the annual appropriations act, which allocates funds for federal agencies.

Read more: https://www.cnn.com/2025/05/11/politics/ice-facility-democrats-arrest-newark-mayor-baraka

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There is no "unitary executive" shit in this country. Congress has the "power of the purse" despite the abdication of duty by the GOP members of Congress.