‘WASHINGTON — The Department of Justice sued four New Jersey cities Thursday for allegedly obstructing federal immigration authorities with their sanctuary policies, The Post can exclusively reveal.
The lawsuit claims officials in Newark, Jersey City, Paterson and Hoboken have been unconstitutionally blocking the feds from coordinating with local authorities to apprehend and deport illegal immigrants.
Acting Assistant Attorney General Yaakov Roth wrote in the complaint that the local policies amounted to “a frontal assault on the federal immigration laws and the federal authorities that administer them.”
“The express purpose and clear effect of these policies … is to thwart federal immigration enforcement,” Roth said. “[E]ven where local law enforcement wants to help the United States deal with the nation’s immigration crisis, the Challenged Policies impede them from doing so.”
“This not only puts the safety of officers at risk, but also endangers the broader communities they are sworn to protect,” he added, claiming the policies violate the US Constitution’s supremacy clause.
The suit comes on the heels of a high-profile clash May 9 involving state and federal Democratic politicians at an Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) detention center in Newark, which ended in the arrest of the city’s mayor Ras Baraka and led to federal charges against Rep. LaMonica McIver (D-NJ).
“Recent events have proven that these New Jersey officials care more about political showmanship than the safety of their communities,” Attorney General Pam Bondi said in a statement.
“As I have made clear, this Justice Department does not tolerate local officials in sanctuary cities obstructing immigration enforcement: there is more litigation to come.”
The DOJ has filed similar lawsuits earlier this year challenging the sanctuary policies of New York, Illinois and Colorado.
The Post has reached out to reps of each city for comment.
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