WASHINGTON (AP) — New Jersey’s top federal prosecutor said Monday that she’s charging Democratic Rep. LaMonica McIver with assault after a skirmish with federal officers who arrested the Newark mayor outside an immigration detention center.
Interim U.S. Attorney Alina Habba announced the charge on social media, but court papers providing details were not immediately released or publicly available online.
Habba said McIver is charged with assaulting, impeding, or interfering with law enforcement.
Habba, at the same time, announced that her office was dismissing a misdemeanor case brought against Newark Mayor Ras Baraka, who was arrested after he attempted to join three members of New Jersey’s congressional delegation inspecting the facility in their oversight capacity. Habba said the decision was reached “for the sake of moving forward.”
“The citizens of New Jersey deserve unified leadership so we can get to work to keep our state safe,” Habba said in a statement.
McIver’s attorney, Paul Fishman, the former U.S. attorney for New Jersey, issued a statement calling the decision to charge McIver “spectacularly inappropriate,” saying she went to Delaney Hall “to do her job” and she has the responsibility as a member of Congress to oversee ICE’s treatment of detainees.
“Rather than facilitating that inspection, ICE agents chose to escalate what should have been a peaceful situation into chaos,” Fishman said. “This prosecution is an attempt to shift the blame for ICE’s behavior to Congresswoman McIver. In the courtroom, facts — not headlines — will matter.”
McIver and the two other Democrats — Bonnie Watson Coleman and Robert Menendez Jr. — had denied any wrongdoing and had accused federal agents of escalating the situation by arresting the mayor.
Rep. McIver released a statement on X that read in part: "The charges against me are purely political - they mischaracterize and distort my actions, and are meant to criminalize and deter legislative oversight."
A nearly two-minute clip released by the Homeland Security Department shows McIver on the facility side of a chain link fence just before the arrest of the mayor on the street side of the fence. She and uniformed officials go through the gate, and she joins others shouting, “surround the mayor.”
The video shows McIver in a tightly packed group of people and officers. At one point, her left elbow and then her right elbow push into an officer wearing a dark face covering and an olive green uniform emblazoned with the word “Police” on it.
New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy weighed in on the announcement, posting the following statement on X: "Members of Congress have an explicit right under the law to inspect ICE and CBP facilities for the purpose of conducting oversight. It is outrageous for a Congresswoman to be criminally charged for exercising her lawful duty to visit a detention site in her own district."
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