Trump created a new Dem superstar: LaMonica McIver
The Justice Department's decision to charge a sitting House lawmaker after a scuffle with ICE officers has launched her on the fast track to stardom in Democratic politics.
Why it matters: First-term Rep. LaMonica McIver (D-N.J.), 38, suddenly has a national profile and status among the Democratic base as something of a hero of the anti-Trump resistance.
But it has also come at a cost: In addition to the financial burden and risks posed by her legal battle, McIver's office has been deluged by furious calls and messages, including many threats.
The vitriol has risen to the point that her office has assigned a staffer to monitor Fox News for segments that will precipitate a new flood of angry calls, a source familiar with the matter told Axios.
State of play: The Justice Department has charged McIver with assaulting law enforcement based on a scuffle she and other Democratic lawmakers had with a group of ICE officers.
The Department of Homeland Security has pointed to body cam footage of McIver elbowing an officer; McIver has said she was the one who was assaulted and cast the charges as politically motivated.
The lawmakers were at the Delaney Hall Detention Center in Newark to protest its use as a migrant holding facility.
Driving the news: In the days after McIver was charged, she went from a virtually unknown member of Congress to a household name.
Reps. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) and Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.) featured her in fundraising emails. So did the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee and the Pennsylvania Democrats.
That dynamic is typically only seen with some of the biggest names in Democratic politics: Think Barack Obama, Nancy Pelosi or Jamie Raskin.
Zoom out: Several Democratic lawmakers have fast-tracked their careers by positioning themselves as Trump's most truculent foes in Congress.
Such was the case with Raskin, a former Trump impeachment manager and Jan. 6 committee member who now leads Democrats on the House Judiciary Committee.
Adam Schiff, another Trump impeachment and Jan. 6 committee veteran, leveraged his anti-Trump bona fides to help him win a U.S. Senate seat.
What they're saying: "They've targeted her in a very unprecedented way, and so a lot of people are going to know about her and her story because we're all uplifting her and it's taken over the country," Rep. Maxwell Frost (D-Fla.) told Axios.
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USA Today
43 minutes ago
- USA Today
Acting NJ U.S. Attorney Alina Habba says Rep. LaMonica McIver indicted
3-minute read A grand jury has indicted U.S. Rep. LaMonica McIver on charges related to an incident at Delaney Hall in Newark last month, said a social media post by acting U.S. Attorney for New Jersey Alina Habba. McIver was at Delaney Hall with Reps. Bonnie Watson Coleman and Rob Menendez to "inspect the treatment of ICE detainees at Delaney Hall." All three are Democrats. The congresswoman said in a statement that the 'facts of this case will prove I was simply doing my job and will expose these proceedings for what they are: a brazen attempt at political intimidation." 'This indictment is no more justified than the original charges, and is an effort by Trump's administration to dodge accountability for the chaos ICE caused and scare me out of doing the work I was elected to do,' McIver said. 'But it won't work — I will not be intimidated. The facts are on our side, I will be entering a plea of not guilty, I'm grateful for the support of my community, and I look forward to my day in court.' Habba said the federal grand jury 'returned a three-count indictment' against McIver for 'forcibly impeding and interfering with federal law enforcement officers.' 'It is my constitutional obligation as the chief federal law enforcement officer for New Jersey to ensure that our federal partners are protected when executing their duties,' she said. 'While people are free to express their views for or against particular policies, they must not do so in a manner that endangers law enforcement and the communities those officers serve.' The three counts have a maximum penalty of eight years for count one, an additional maximum penalty of eight years for count two and a maximum penalty of one year for count three. McIver's lawyer, Paul Fishman, who served as U.S. attorney in New Jersey during the Obama administration, said June 10 that the "legal process will expose this prosecution for what it truly is — political retaliation against a dedicated public servant who refuses to shy away from her oversight responsibilities." Earlier: NJ Rep. LaMonica McIver makes court appearance for assault charges in Newark ICE incident McIver: 'Fulfilling our lawful oversight' McIver said in a statement on May 19 that she and her colleagues were "fulfilling our lawful oversight responsibilities, as members of Congress have done many times before, and our visit should have been peaceful and short." "Instead, ICE agents created an unnecessary and unsafe confrontation when they chose to arrest Mayor Baraka," she said. "The charges against me are purely political — they mischaracterize and distort my actions, and are meant to criminalize and deter legislative oversight." Newark Mayor Ras Baraka was arrested at Delaney Hall on charges of trespassing, but the charges have since been dropped. He is suing Habba alleging 'false arrest and malicious prosecution.' Fishman said in May that the "decision to charge Congresswoman McIver is spectacularly inappropriate." "She went to Delaney Hall to do her job. As a member of Congress, she has the right and responsibility to see how ICE is treating detainees," Fishman said. "Rather than facilitating that inspection, ICE agents chose to escalate what should have been a peaceful situation into chaos. This prosecution is an attempt to shift the blame for ICE's behavior to Congresswoman McIver. In the courtroom, facts — not headlines — will matter." Katie Sobko covers the New Jersey Statehouse. Email: sobko@
Atlantic
an hour ago
- Atlantic
Brad Lander's Stand
As ICE agents dragged Brad Lander, the New York City comptroller and a candidate for mayor, down the hallway of a federal courthouse this week, he repeatedly—and politely—asked to see their judicial warrant. Lander had locked arms with an undocumented man he identified as Edgardo, and refused to let go. Eventually, the ICE agents yanked Lander away from the man, shoved him against a wall, and handcuffed him. Lander told them that they didn't have the authority to arrest U.S. citizens. They arrested him anyway. The courthouse is only a few blocks away from the one where Donald Trump was convicted last year of 34 felony crimes for falsifying business records. His supporters painted the criminal-justice process as a politically motivated witch hunt. But none of them seems to mind now that masked ICE agents are lurking behind corners in the halls of justice to snatch up undocumented migrants who show up for their hearings. This was not the first time Lander had accompanied someone to the courthouse, and it wouldn't be his last. The Department of Homeland Security claimed that Lander had been 'arrested for assaulting law enforcement and impeding a federal officer.' The whole thing is on video, so anyone can see that there was no assault. Lander is about as mild-mannered a politician as they come. Matt Welch, a libertarian blogger and no fan of Lander, wrote on X that the only things Lander had ever assaulted were 'Coney Island hot dogs and school-zone speed limits.' He's the kind of old-fashioned elected official who doesn't much exist anymore, the kind you see at public-library events or can call when your kid's day care is shut down and know he'll actually do something about it. A different kind of politician would have milked the attention for all it was worth. But if Brad Lander were a different kind of politician, he might be first and not third in the polls. 'I did not come today expecting to be arrested,' he told reporters after being released. 'But I really think I failed today, because my goal was really to get Edgardo out of the building.' People who are used to living in a democracy tend to find it unsettling when elected officials are arrested, or thrown to the ground and handcuffed for asking questions at press conferences. They don't like to see elected officials indicted for trying to intervene in the arrest of other elected officials. And they find it traumatizing when, as has been happening in Los Angeles and elsewhere, they see law-abiding neighbors and co-workers they've known for years grabbed and deported. The question now is what Americans are going to do about it. Los Angeles has offered one model of response. Although Trump campaigned on finding and deporting undocumented criminals, in order to hit aggressive quotas, ICE has changed its tactics and started barging into workplaces. Citizens have reported being detained simply because they look Hispanic. Residents of one Latino neighborhood recorded ICE officers driving in an armored vehicle. Many residents felt that the raids were an invasion by the president's personal storm troopers, and marched into the streets in response. The first groups of protesters were organized by unions, but soon, other Angelenos —of many ages and backgrounds—joined them. Most of the protesters were peaceful, chanting and marching and performing mariachi around federal buildings in downtown L.A. But others were not. They defaced buildings with graffiti and summoned Waymos, the driverless taxis, in order to set them on fire. The right seized on a chance to reinforce the narrative that California is in the grip of dangerous radical-left activists, categorizing the protests as 'violent riots.' Trump overrode Gavin Newsom, the governor of California, to deploy the National Guard, and sent in Marines to protect ICE officers. Of course, that meant only that more Angelenos came out to protest. There were arrests and rubber-coated bullets and clouds of tear gas. I would have thought that the reaction to the protests from anyone outside the MAGAverse would have been pretty uniform. Democrats have been warning Americans for years about Trump's descent into authoritarianism. Now it is happening—the deportations, the arrests, the president's face on banners across government buildings, the tank parade. 'Democracy is under assault right before our eyes,' Newsom said. And yet, so many Democratic leaders, public intellectuals, and members of the media seemed distinctly uneasy about the protests. Yes, they seem to say, ICE has been acting illegally, but what about the Waymos? In The Washington Post, David Ignatius fretted about protesters waving Mexican flags and wondered if the 'activists' were actually working for Trump. Democratic leaders were 'worried the confrontation elevates a losing issue for the party,' The New York Times reported. Politico raised a more cynical question: 'Which Party Should Be More Worried About the Politics of the LA Protests?' Many Democrats denounced vandalism while supporting the right to protest. But the Democratic Senator John Fetterman of Pennsylvania was harsh in his criticism of the protesters, lamenting that the random acts of violence and property damage by a few bad actors would cause Democrats to lose the ' moral high ground.' There is a time for politicians to fine-tune a message for maximum appeal. But this is a case of actual public outrage against the trampling of inalienable rights. This is not a fight for the moral high ground; this is a fight against authoritarianism. Democrats made themselves hoarse warning against the threat to democracy Trump's second term would present. They invoked autocracy and even fascism to stir the public to keep Trump out of office. Obviously, it didn't work. But that threat is no longer abstract. It's now very real. And for all the speeches imploring Americans to save democracy at the polls, the Democratic establishment seems remarkably tepid about supporting Americans defending democracy in the streets. Yes, Democrats would have an easier time in the court of public opinion if no protester ever picked up a can of spray paint. And certainly, setting cars on fire is not good. I myself would love to have a nice, quiet summer. But I want to save our democracy more. We can't afford to get distracted for even a moment by the excesses of a few protesters, which are vanishingly small compared with the excesses of the president of the United States. Defending liberty is a messy business: You might remember all that tea tossed into Boston Harbor. The phrase 'Rebellion to tyrants is obedience to God' was once considered for the Great Seal of the United States. (Thomas Jefferson adopted it for his own seal at Monticello.) And yet, although the civil-rights movement is remembered for Martin Luther King Jr.'s civil disobedience, the movement included riots and armed activist groups. Violent protests, such as the Oakland riots of 1967, were a significant part of anti-draft and anti–Vietnam War movements. Their violence did not invalidate the causes those earlier movements sought to advance, any more than the property damage caused by a few activists today invalidates the claims of the great majority of peaceful protesters. Historically, protest movements are seen as 'civil' only in retrospect. For a party that you'd think would be fighting with everything they're worth, Democrats seem remarkably focused on preserving the status quo. Even after the loss of the presidency and both houses of Congress, Democrats won't shake anything up. Despite her popularity, Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez has been kept out of any committee-leadership position. David Hogg, the young anti-gun activist, was ousted from his position as vice chair of the Democratic National Committee after he announced his plan to back primary challengers against older Democratic incumbents in hopes of breathing new life into the party. Earlier this week, Trump announced on Truth Social that he had directed ICE to focus on what he sees as enemy territory: Democratic-leaning cities that have 'turned once Idyllic Towns into scenes of Third World Dystopia.' New York and L.A. are both sanctuary cities—they have passed laws pledging to limit their cooperation with federal immigration authorities. We shouldn't be surprised to see more citizens of these cities stepping up to protect their neighbors and their communities. That is exactly what Lander was attempting to do when he was arrested. 'This is part of what authoritarians do,' Lander told Democracy Now following his release. 'Our challenge is to find a way to stand up for the rule of law, for due process, for people's rights, and to do it in a way that is nonviolent and insistent, demands it, but also doesn't help them escalate conflict.' Lander's clarity in this moment makes him a rarity, even in the highest levels of the Democratic Party. Last Saturday, when an estimated 5 million Americans protested the Trump administration and New Yorkers marched up Fifth Avenue, two of New York's most powerful elected officials, Hakeem Jeffries and Chuck Schumer, the minority leaders of the House and the Senate, were in the Hamptons, dining on bavette and chilled English pea soup to celebrate the marriage of the megadonor Alex Soros to Huma Abedin, Hillary Clinton's longtime aide. Meanwhile, Lander was out in the streets, side by side with his constituents. A few days later, leaving the courthouse, he assured New Yorkers that he was fine, his only lasting damage a button torn from his shirt as a result of ICE's rough treatment. But, he warned, 'the rule of law is not fine, and our constitutional democracy is not fine.'
San Francisco Chronicle
an hour ago
- San Francisco Chronicle
California will do anything to protect immigrants — except build them housing
Over the past several weeks, hundreds of thousands of Californians have taken to the streets to protest the Trump administration's increasingly authoritarian efforts to deport the state's undocumented population. There's a moral imperative behind these protests; the vast majority of the people being targeted by federal agents are law-abiding workers with no criminal records. There's a practical one, too: This state cannot function without its migrant workers, particularly our agricultural sector. It isn't just that undocumented workers will accept lower wages than their American counterparts. Farming is hard, skilled labor. Absent changes to federal immigration policy that would allow and incentivize more migrants to come here legally, California doesn't have the trained workforce it needs to feed itself and the nation. (We accounted for 41% of the country's vegetable sales in 2022.) And so, Californians and our politicians have rightly gone to battle with President Donald Trump. Yet as supportive as this editorial board is of these efforts, we'd be remiss if we didn't call something out: This state needs to become as passionate about housing our essential workers as it is about fighting Immigration and Customs Enforcement. It's been just over two and a half years since the deadly shootings in Half Moon Bay put the Dickensian living conditions of California's farmworkers — the vast majority of whom are undocumented — on the national radar. For decades, California had allowed its migrant workers to live in overcrowded, mold-filled housing with bacteria-ridden drinking water. That's if it housed them at all. What's changed? Not nearly enough, according to San Mateo County Supervisor Ray Mueller, whose district includes the site of the 2023 massacre. Building housing on farmland in his district has proven to be a logistical challenge amid drainage issues, sewage concerns and access to drinkable water. Yet trying to build worker housing off-site hits an even more intractable roadblock. 'The coastal community is, by a large majority, supportive of farmworkers,' he said. 'The opposition you run into is around density.' San Mateo County is hardly unique in this regard. In Marin County, for instance, an effort to build housing for the workers, many undocumented, being displaced by the closure of ranches in the Point Reyes National Seashore has been met with a lawsuit by NIMBY groups. This is, of course, unacceptable. And yet, state and local rules still too often empower obstructionism. Mueller said the arduous progress San Mateo County has made in building farmworker housing was mostly achieved using emergency powers that streamlined the usual permitting processes. 'The state was wonderful in getting our project moving,' Mueller said. 'We just need to do that at scale across the state.' We're nowhere close. In 2024, California lawmakers passed a measure to exempt farmworker housing up to 150 units from review under the California Environmental Quality Act. However, this streamlining applied to only two counties: Santa Clara and Santa Cruz. A bill in the state Legislature, AB457 from Assembly Member Esmerelda Soria, D-Merced, would expand those streamlining measures to Fresno, Madera and Merced counties. Over 40% of the state's land is used for agriculture. We're never going to get anywhere with a drip-drop of county-by-county CEQA carve-outs. Assembly Member Damon Connolly, D-San Rafael, told the editorial board he'd be supportive of an effort to expand CEQA streamlining to his district and perhaps even statewide. But even that wouldn't be enough, Mueller said. For many Bay Area farming communities, the California Coastal Commission has its own separate and arduous permitting process. Without streamlining bills to cover this and CEQA, little progress will be made. And now an even greater challenge comes from the Trump administration. Farmworker-specific housing makes easy pickings for federal raids. Mueller says he fears his efforts to build new farmworker housing may have inadvertently 'put a target on the back' of the people he's spent years trying to help. This fear isn't theoretical. Gov. Gavin Newsom's office recently issued a press release saying that federal deportation authorities requested and received the addresses and immigration status of Medi-Cal recipients after the state expanded health insurance benefits to low-income undocumented workers. Tailored government efforts for the undocumented risk creating a paper trail that puts them in danger. 'It is clear that we must reassess our programs to ensure we are doing all we can to protect the personal information of our community,' incoming state Senate President Pro Tem Monique Limón, D-Santa Barbara, told the editorial board. We don't have the answer to this quandary on the health care front. But California can do something for migrant workers as it relates to housing — something Limón and too many other California politicians have been reluctant to do. Make it easier to build. AB457 is an admission from legislators that CEQA creates onerous and unnecessary impediments to development. Yet housing streamlining bills such as SB79 from San Francisco state Sen. Scott Wiener, which would exempt developments near transit from CEQA review, provided they comply with local affordable housing mandates and other criteria, are receiving immense political pushback. Undocumented renters in California have virtually the same rights as everyone else in the private rental market under the Immigrant Tenant Protection Act. And landlords are prohibited from disclosing, or typically even asking about, immigration status. But without an adequate housing supply, those protections go to waste. Can most undocumented workers afford to buy a shiny new condo? Almost certainly not. But they could potentially move into older units that open up when other renters decide to buy. And they certainly could benefit from the development of new mother-in-law units — such as those that might have been built had cities like San Diego not just rolled back their accessory dwelling unit laws in the face of community opposition. If California is willing to fight the federal government to keep its undocumented residents here, it should also be willing to fight to ensure they don't live in squalor.
