Rep. LaMonica McIver pleaded not responsible Wednesday to federal fees accusing her of assaulting and interfering with immigration officers outdoors a New Jersey detention middle throughout a congressional oversight go to on the facility.
“They won’t intimidate me. They won’t cease me from doing my job,” she stated outdoors the courthouse in Newark after the temporary listening to.
McIver, a Democrat, was charged by interim US Legal professional Alina Habba, a Republican appointed by President Donald Trump, following the Might 9 go to to Newark’s Delaney Corridor. Immigration and Customs Enforcement makes use of the privately owned, 1,000-bed facility as a detention middle.
This month she was indicted on three counts of assaulting, resisting, impeding and interfering with federal officers. Two of the counts carry a most sentence of as much as eight years in jail. The third is a misdemeanor with a most punishment of 1 12 months in jail.
Throughout Wednesday’s listening to, McIver stood and instructed US District Decide Jamel Semper: “Your honor, I plead not responsible.” The decide set a Nov. 10 trial date.
Exterior the courthouse, McIver warned that anybody who pushes again in opposition to the Trump administration will discover themselves in the same place.
McIver’s lawyer, former US Legal professional for New Jersey Paul Fishman, stated McIver pleaded not responsible as a result of she will not be responsible. He stated federal brokers created a dangerous state of affairs at Delaney Corridor.
A message searching for remark Wednesday was left with Habba’s workplace.
Amongst these at McIver’s facet Wednesday had been her household and elected officers, together with Newark Mayor Ras Baraka, who was outdoors the detention middle with McIver and different legislators on Might 9.
Baraka was additionally arrested on a trespassing cost that was later dropped and is suing Habba over what he referred to as a malicious prosecution.
Baraka accused the Trump administration of utilizing legislation enforcement as “an appendage of their ideology to start to hammer us.”
The indictment of McIver is the newest improvement in a legal-political drama that has seen the Trump administration take Democratic officers from New Jersey’s largest metropolis to courtroom amid the president’s ongoing immigration crackdown and Democrats’ efforts to reply. The prosecution is a uncommon federal prison case in opposition to a sitting member of Congress for allegations apart from fraud or corruption.
A virtually two-minute video clip launched by the Division of Homeland Safety reveals McIver on the facility inside a chain-link fence simply earlier than Baraka’s arrest on different facet of the barrier, the place different folks had been protesting. McIver and uniformed officers undergo the gate, and she or he joins others shouting that they need to circle the mayor.
The video reveals McIver in a tightly packed group of individuals and officers. At one level her left elbow after which her proper elbow push into an officer sporting a darkish face overlaying and an olive inexperienced uniform emblazoned with the phrase “Police.”
It isn’t clear from police bodycam video if the contact was intentional, incidental or the results of jostling within the chaotic scene.
The grievance alleges that she “slammed” her forearm into an agent after which tried to restrain the agent by grabbing him.
The indictment additionally says she positioned her arms across the mayor to attempt to cease his arrest and says once more that she slammed her forearm into and grabbed an agent.
Democrats together with New Jersey Reps. Bonnie Watson Coleman and Rob Menendez, who had been with McIver on the detention middle that day, have criticized the arrest and disputed the costs.
Members of Congress are legally approved to enter federal immigration amenities as a part of their oversight powers, even with out discover. Congress handed a 2019 appropriations invoice spelling out that authority.
McIver, 39, first got here to Congress in September in a particular election after the dying of Rep. Donald Payne Jr. left a emptiness within the tenth District. She was then elected to a full time period in November.
A Newark native, she was president of the Newark Metropolis Council from 2022 to 2024 and labored within the metropolis’s public colleges earlier than that.
