On Friday’s broadcast of MS NOW’s “Morning Joe,” New York Gov. Kathy Hochul (D) discussed legislation she signed forbidding local law enforcement in the state from engaging in certain agreements with ICE and said that “I wish they would just disband and go back to the old Immigration and Naturalization Service.” And “This is a rogue policing state that is wreaking havoc across America.”
Hochul began by saying, “New York state will never be a sanctuary for criminals, full stop. We work with federal law enforcement, including ICE, when it comes to protecting New Yorkers, and that means we always have and always will work to get criminals off the streets and in the criminal justice system, get their justice, go to jail, and then go back to their home country. That’s how we do it in New York.”
She continued, “But what we had before was, there were counties that had relationships with ICE, formal agreements, where they would actually be using local law enforcement for civil immigration enforcement. I’m not talking about criminals. I’m talking about someone who the only offense is coming into this country, and these are people with temporary protective status, maybe they had a green card, a work permit, married to an American citizen. They’re going after everybody, because they have to hit those inane Stephen Miller quotas. So, I’ve said, and we passed a law, and it went into effect just this week, you cannot have those agreements with ICE to be using local cops for doing your job, ICE. I want local cops focused on local crimes. And crime has gone down dramatically since I’ve been Governor in the state of New York for the last five years, and it’s because I’ve invested money in law enforcement. We’re building trust between communities and law enforcement.”
Hochul concluded, “It has nothing to do with having our local police diverted from catching the rapists, catching the murderers, responding to an emergency, and doing ICE’s job for them. It’s an $85 billion agency. I think they can take care of themselves. In fact, I wish they would just disband and go back to the old Immigration and Naturalization Service. Remember old INS? People trusted them. They did their jobs. This is a rogue policing state that is wreaking havoc across America. In New York, we say, no more.”
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