Mamdani demands release of New York council employee detained by US agents | New York
Federal immigration officials detained a New York City Council staffer on Monday; That sparked outrage from city leaders and renewed rebukes of the Trump administration’s immigration actions.
“This is an attack on our democracy, our city and our values,” Mayor Zohran Mamdani said in a statement to X. “I call for his immediate release and will continue to monitor the situation.”
The employee was hired during a “routine immigration appointment,” according to statements from Mamdani and council president Julie Menin. The council was informed he was taken into custody on Monday afternoon. employee called The council’s human resources department is asking for help, ABC News reported.
menin did not name the employeebut he said he was legally in the United States and had permission to remain in the country until October 2026. He said the council was working to secure his release and described the action as “extremism”.
“Across the country, we have seen aggressive escalations by ICE that have raised serious concerns about excessive use of force and lack of accountability,” he said. “As New Yorkers, we will defend the rights and dignity of every neighbor.”
Menin told reporters at a news conference Monday afternoon that the Department of Homeland Security gave no justification for his detention and transferred him to a detention center in Manhattan.
Speaking at the briefing, Democratic New York congressman Dan Goldman emphasized that the employee was “a law-abiding immigrant with a work permit” and said he was of Venezuelan origin.
“I want to be very clear: There is no indication that there was anything going on with this individual other than his immigration status that would lead to his arrest,” Goldman said.
Actions are part of a pattern; Federal officers targeted immigration appointments across the country last year in what appeared to be a coordinated operation. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officials are also known to haunt mandatory immigration checks; It’s a strategy seen by experts as a trap set for the law-abiding.
“This is bad policy,” Lindsay Toczylowski, president of the Immigrant Defenders Legal Center (ImmDef), told the Guardian last May, as the trend began to emerge more widely. “By placing immigration officers in courtrooms, they are discouraging people from following processes, punishing people for following the rules.”
Meanwhile, the Trump administration has announced an increase in deployments as it ramps up ICE operations. Despite growing protests against the violent and destructive tactics used by officers to carry out the president’s deportation agenda, there are plans to increase the agency’s actions this year.
Thousands of people took to the streets across the country this week following the shooting of Minneapolis resident Renee Nicole Good, who was killed by an ICE agent.
Minnesota attorney general Keith Ellison also announced Monday that he would file a lawsuit against the federal government in hopes of stemming the influx of ICE agents descending on the state.
Ellison said: “We claim that [the] DHS’s use of excessive and lethal force, warrantless, racist arrests, targeting of our courts, churches, houses of worship, and schools, and our violations of administrative procedures lead to arbitrary and capricious federal actions. And we want the courts to end the influx of thousands of DHS agents in Minnesota.”
