Republicans are firing warning shots at Gov. Kathy Hochul and other Democratic state lawmakers: If you pass new laws to protect immigrants across New York, there will be consequences.
Tom Homan, an upstate New York native who serves as President Donald Trump’s border czar, said he would respond to any new law by sending more U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents to the Empire State.
“We're going to flood the zone. You're going to see more ICE agents than you've ever seen before,” Homan said Tuesday at a border security conference in Phoenix, seen in a video posted to social media by a Newsmax reporter and widely cited in media reports Tuesday. “So congratulations, because when we send these teams out there, we'll find a bad guy. Most times we do. And when we find a bad guy, he's with others, others who may not be a priority target, but they're in the country illegally.”
Hochul said Tuesday that lawmakers were “almost done” with a $263 billion state budget that lawmakers say will include new protections for immigrants.
Gothamist reported last week that a package expected as part of the budget would ban formal 287(g) agreements with the federal government that cross-deputize local officers for immigration duties, bar local jails from holding people for ICE and restrict when on-duty ICE agents can cover their faces.
Immigrant rights advocates and some Democratic legislators say the provisions of the law will let local police focus their efforts on solving crime. It will also help engender trust between immigrants, including crime victims, and local officers, the advocates said.
Hochul responded to Homan’s threat at an unrelated press conference by pledging that the state would continue to work with ICE “in cases of dangerous criminals.”
“That will not waver,” she said. “All I'll say to Mr. Homan is that Donald Trump himself said he would not send a surge of ICE agents to the state of New York unless I ask. I'm not asking.”
Homan took over immigration enforcement from Border Patrol Commander Greg Bovino, who led the aggressive surge of thousands of federal agents into Minneapolis, Minnesota over the winter. On Saturday, protesters in Brooklyn clashed with ICE agents who had taken a detainee to a hospital after an arrest.
Some localities in the state, including New York City and Buffalo, have stricter local sanctuary policies on the books. State lawmakers are still negotiating language about exactly what coordination between state and federal law enforcement would still be allowed under the proposed state law.
But it’s already clear that Long Island’s Nassau County, where Republican gubernatorial candidate Bruce Blakeman is the county executive, will be one of the most immediately affected areas. Hundreds of people detained for ICE are currently in the Nassau County Jail, and the county has one of the most expansive 287(g) agreements in the state.
Blakeman met with Trump in Washington on Tuesday. The county executive blasted the emerging immigration law during a trip to the state Capitol on Monday.
“I will go to federal court immediately. I don't think they have the right to do that,” he said of the proposed ban on 287(g) agreements. “It's insane — just absolutely insane. People talk about ICE as if they're bad people. We've worked very, very well together with them.”
