New York is creating a team of legal observers that will don purple vests to monitor and record the Trump administration’s immigration enforcement officers as they seek to detain and deport migrants, the state’s attorney general said on Tuesday.
The announcement follows weeks of sometimes violent tumult in Minneapolis, where Donald Trump has deployed thousands of armed, masked agents as he tries to deport more migrants than any of his predecessors.
The New York attorney general, Letitia James, said the state’s new legal observers would be volunteer employees from her office, trained to observe, without interfering, whether Trump’s immigration enforcement “remains within the bounds of the law”.
“I am proud to protect New Yorkers’ constitutional rights to speak freely, protest peacefully, and go about their lives without fear of unlawful federal action,” James, a Democrat, said in a statement. “We have seen in Minnesota how quickly and tragically federal operations can escalate in the absence of transparency and accountability.“
The Department of Homeland Security, which oversees ICE, said James was putting New Yorkers in danger by not working with ICE.
This might seem pretty tame when we all want bolder actions, but if things work out and we get our own Nuremberg trials, we need all the reliable documentation we can get to hunt these traitors down and bring them to justice.
I think this is a great idea, but can use one little change: they should all have body cams streaming ICE behavior publicly in real-time.
I think it will change things greatly if ICE knows they are all being watched, all the time.
They should have heavily armed bodyguards as well.
They should be tagged in the videos as they are identified too
Two of their murders were already observed and extremely well documented, yet the murderers will see no consequences for their actions.
Perhaps actively stopping the murderers before they murder is a better approach?
Catch them while on their way to work, ship them to El Salvadorian labor camps. Stonewall their families so they never know. 🤌
Respectfully we have plenty enough observers via the different Ice Patrols and rapid response groups.
What we need from the State Government is them to actually grow a spine and send their cops and troops after the Green Shirts.
“Keeping to the constitution.” Is not going to save us because this Federal administration is using it as literal toilet paper
While I get what you’re saying, having officially anointed state observers that are sitting there and being like “the state of New York is officially watching you, and I’m it” is a change to the equation.
Sure, it’s “just a few more observers”, but any of those state appointed observers witnessing constitutional (state or federal) or state law breaches are probably going to yield immediate and aggressive state prosecution of any ICE agents involved.
And if ICEatzgruppen decides to accost or arrest any of those officially appointed observers, that kind of a signal to begin no-holds-barred total legal warfare.
Public observers are absolutely important. But this is important a different reason.
Thanks, stranger. Sometimes my cynicism takes me toward dark places, but this is a splash of realistic optimism.
Hey, no worries. I get pessimistic as fuck about shit these days, especially when everyone who’s ostensibly in a position to do anything about anything is like “this is a very disturbing development 🙁” and then resigns their position in protest or votes to fund ICEatzgruppen or whatever. It absolutely fucking maddening.
But I view this development as one of the first true signs that officialdom is laying some groundwork to be like “no. Fuck you. We are going to use the system you are trying to abuse against you. And if you end run it, we are going to make it very fucking clear that the system no longer applies to anyone, anywhere.”
Or at least, that’s where I hope this stuff goes.
Oh no, don’t threaten them with passivity
Or you could ban businesses and local government entities from helping? Without access to unmarked police vehicles or rentals things get complicated. Ban gas stations from providing gas. Make them get gas from federal pumps.
How about both? I like both ideas, and any others that hold these goons accountable.
The populace is doing that already. Late to the party, but still welcome.
Prediction: these state-sanctioned legal observers are gonna be used to “enforce the law” against the protesters, not ICE.
Like why on earth are we giving this faction of capital the benefit of the doubt over the other faction of capital? They’re all acting on the behalf of some subset of the capitalist class. Of course they come into conflict with other factions of capital, but their main class interests are, and always will be, bourgeois above all else.
Leticia James has no reason to be complicit with Donald Trump’s fascism.
Say what you will about how slow justice was during the Trump Interregnum, but James’ office was the only one that managed to push charges that stuck, and that led to conviction. Trump escaped punishment by getting elected President again, then used the power of his office to go after James personally.
If there is a single person in authority here with a score to settle with Donald Trump, it’s her.
I am confident that her and her government’s class allegiance to the local bourgeoisie will trump her distaste for Trump, not in every way, but certainly in all the ways that actually make a difference.
Yes, James has been individually, personally fucked over by Trump, and yes she has managed to inconvenience Trump’s faction of capital, but her class interests, which can be inferred from her government position and liberal politics, indicate that she will go ultimately do what’s best for her faction of capital. Which is whatever helps maintain liberal capitalism, e.g. hamper effective (i.e illegal or de facto illegal) forms of resistance.
I.e., she is anti-“Trump’s faction of capital”, but as a capitalist politician, is principally anti-proletarian.
I hope I’m wrong on this but I’m super confident that I won’t be 😮💨
Stand down, Comrade, and read her bio. Yes, she’s a lawyer, but she has spent her whole law career as a public defender and local politician, eventually becoming the NYC Public Advocate, which is a weird position that amounts to a Deputy Mayor who is a permanent government ombudsman/watchdog.
She is literally the last person you should be accusing of class warfare. Sometimes, a politician is just a politician, and not part of a capitalist plot…
Leticia James is amazing. I worked for a Fidelis care and they had managed medicaid plans for NYS. Pre-covid a gentleman was approved for pain injections, but couldn’t get into the office before his authorization ran out, because anything non emergent was closed. Once the doctor’s office was open, the doctor submitted a new request, with the same clinical information, and it was denied. I put an appeal together for this man, painstakingly pulling the clinical records from the first authorization, the second authorization, EVERY PAID CLAIM related to his condition, AND EVERY RX CLAIM FOR PAIN MEDS the company paid for. 4 hours of work. The appeals team denied it in 15 later. I rage quit, helped the man file an external appeal through the state department of finances. The state ruled in favor of that medicaid client. Then I helped that man file a complaint against the insurance carrier with the NYS attorney general, (Leticia James.) There was lots of other bullshit going down at Fidelis, like denying claims for covid testing, which I also helped consumers make complaints about because I new what was going on was illegal. Leticia James raked them over the fucking coals. She has been fighting for everyday people, and she makes me proud to be a NYer.
