Blakeman: Nassau to comply with ban on ICE partnerships

Nassau County Executive Bruce Blakeman said Wednesday that he is complying with a new state law banning local partnership agreements with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

The announcement came one day after New York Attorney General Letitia James issued subpoenas to Nassau's police and sheriff's departments as the law went into effect. Gov. Kathy Hochul also promised legal action against counties like Nassau that had not said they would comply.

Blakeman, who is running for governor against Hochul, has been one of the most vocal supporters of the ICE agreements in New York and has regularly blasted Hochul’s support of the new law.

"This is one of the saddest days of my life as county executive," Blakeman said at a news conference Wednesday afternoon. "I know it's going to make it more dangerous here in Nassau County." 

"I am a law-and-order county executive," he said. "I believe in the rule of law. ... We don't get to pick and choose the laws that we have to enforce or abide by."

The new law, the Local Cops, Local Crimes Act, prohibits state and local employees from questioning people solely for immigration purposes, unless they are required to by a federal judicial warrant, and prohibits government employees from letting ICE agents into schools and other sensitive locations without a judicial warrant.

It does not prevent local law enforcement from working with ICE on criminal matters.

Nassau County was one of two counties in the state that had not said they would comply, along with Rensselaer County, near Albany.

Hochul said Tuesday that ICE partnerships aren't necessary to keep New Yorkers safe, and that only a handful of the state's 62 counties had them.

"I've heard some argue that ending these pacts with ICE somehow jeopardizes public safety," she said. "People making claims that are detached from reality, or just desperate for attention, perhaps both."

A group of 15 county sheriffs filed a federal lawsuit on Tuesday challenging the ban on cooperation agreements. Blakeman said he was directing Robert Matarazzo, Nassau's acting sheriff, to join the lawsuit.

Nassau's agreements

Both the Nassau County police and sheriff's departments had agreements with ICE that began shortly after President Donald Trump returned to office last year. The police department deputized 10 detectives to assist ICE with immigration enforcement efforts, and the sheriff's department held thousands of immigrants for ICE at an East Meadow jail.

Dozens of Nassau police officers and other law enforcement officials surrounded Blakeman at Wednesday's news conference. He thanked officers for their support, and applauded the partnership for helping get alleged criminals into federal custody, including a man who police say started seven fires in Nassau earlier this year.

Blakeman also said the program facilitated transferring 28 people into ICE custody during a sweeping week of arrests last year that police said was among the largest gang takedowns in Nassau history.

Bryan Flanagan, assistant director of ICE's New York City field office, said at the news conference that ending the agreements would not make communities safer.

"State officials describe this as a measure to keep local police focused on local crimes," Flanagan said. "But in practice, ending [the program] removes a public safety tool used to identify criminal aliens."

Early to sign on

Federal partnerships between ICE and local authorities date to the late 1990s and historically were championed mostly in Republican-led Southern states. But after Trump returned to office, Blakeman was among the first officials in the nation to sign on, making Nassau the second county in New York to join the program.

At the time, Blakeman said officials would focus on immigrants accused of committing crimes, not "law-abiding waiters, busboys, landscapers and others who are not criminals, even though they may not be in the United States legally."

Nassau became a hub for federal agents, who were largely prevented from cooperating with local authorities in neighboring Suffolk County and New York City.

A year and a half later, Newsday has reported that less than 5% of immigrants held in East Meadow had violent criminal convictions. Local police also handed over dozens of immigrants to ICE who were accused of offenses like theft, drug possession and prostitution.

Newsday investigated the cases of 22 women arrested at illicit massage spas who prosecutors and advocates say should have been treated as victims rather than criminals.

Backlash from critics

The partnership has drawn ire from activists and a lawsuit from the New York Civil Liberties Union. 

Nadia Marin-Molina, an anti-ICE activist and co-executive director of the National Day Laborers Organizing Network, warned against Nassau officials continuing to work with ICE off-the-books. Informal cooperation with ICE is banned under the new law.

Earlier this year, Newsday reported that Nassau's Probation Department was telling federal agents when defendants were expected in court, so ICE could arrest them. The practice upset prosecutors and families who wanted those defendants in prison, rather than being deported.

Asked about informal cooperation on Wednesday, Blakeman said officials would comply with the law.