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lamonica mciver
As McIver Pleads Not Guilty, Rights Group Sounds Alarm Over Trump 'Intimidation Campaign'
"The Trump administration is attempting to silence opposition through fear, but New Jersey will not be intimidated by authoritarianism," said the head of the ACLU of New Jersey.
Jun 25, 2025
At a hearing in New Jersey on Wednesday, Democratic Rep. LaMonica McIver of New Jersey pleaded not guilty to multiple charges stemming from an incident outside of an Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention facility in Newark last month.
Politico reported that McIver and her attorney said they plan to challenge the charges on both legal and factual grounds.
"At the end of the day, this is all about political intimidation," McIver said to a crowd that gathered outside the courthouse.
JUST NOW: LaMonica McIver gives a powerful speech after pleading not guilty: "We will fight this. At the end of the day this is all about political intimidation. The Trump administration and his cronies have weaponized the federal government. I will not stand for it. They will… pic.twitter.com/kMeIeXqeDK
— Marco Foster (@MarcoFoster_) June 25, 2025
The executive director of the ACLU of New Jersey, Amol Sinha, said in a statement on Wednesday that the prosecution of McIver is "a shameful escalation of the Trump administration's intimidation campaign against those who refuse to do its bidding."
"The Trump administration is attempting to silence opposition through fear, but New Jersey will not be intimidated by authoritarianism," Sinha also said. "We urge all members of Congress—as well as state and local elected officials—to exercise their oversight authority to provide strong checks and balances on President Trump's abuses of power that continue to undermine the fundamental freedoms at the bedrock of our democracy."
On May 9, McIver two other members of Congress were at an ICE detention facility called Delaney Hall to conduct congressional oversight when the Democratic Newark Mayor Ras Baraka joined them there. When federal agents ordered Baraka to leave and then went to arrest him, McIver and the other lawmakers moved to intervene, according to documentation of the episode and official accounts. NPR reported that the administration's narrative around the episode has shifted over time.
In June, interim U.S. Attorney Alina Habba announced that McIver had been charged with a three-count indictment for forcibly interfering with federal officers.
Following her indictment, McIver released a statement on June 10, saying 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. But it won't work—I will not be intimidated," McIver said.
There have been several explosive interactions between federal agents and Democratic officials since May. On June 17, New York City Comptroller Brad Lander was arrested by federal agents at an immigration court in lower Manhattan while escorting an individual out of immigration court. And the week prior, U.S. Sen. Alex Padilla (D-Calif.) was handcuffed on the ground after being forcibly removed from a news conference that was held by U.S. Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem in Los Angeles.
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'None of Us Knows Who Will Be Next,' Pro-Democracy Coalition Says After McIver Indictment
"Our justice system should not be a tool in Trump's authoritarian power grabs," said the Not Above the Law Coalition.
Jun 11, 2025
The leaders of a pro-democracy coalition warned Tuesday that the grand jury indictment of Democratic U.S. Rep. LaMonica McIver marks a "chilling escalation" of President Donald Trump's lawless and dangerous efforts to crush his political opponents using the power of the federal government, including the Justice Department and U.S. military.
"Trump has shown time and again that he’ll use the levers of federal power to punish his critics," said the Not Above the Law coalition, an alliance that includes more than 150 advocacy groups, grassroots organizers, legal scholars, and others.
"Whether it's deploying the military against protesters in California, arresting a sitting judge in Wisconsin, or prosecuting members of Congress in New Jersey, his actions are designed to silence anyone who stands in his way and undermine checks and balances," said coalition co-chairs Lisa Gilbert of Public Citizen, Praveen Fernandes of the Constitutional Accountability Center, Kelsey Herbert of MoveOn, and Brett Edkins of Stand Up America.
McIver (D-N.J.) was indicted Tuesday on three counts of "forcibly impeding and interfering with federal officers," charges stemming from her involvement in a May oversight visit at a privately run migrant detention center in Newark, New Jersey and subsequent confrontation with Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents outside of the facility.
If found guilty, McIver could face up to 17 years in prison.
"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."
In a statement following the indictment, McIver said she will be "entering a plea of not guilty" and expressed confidence 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," said McIver. "But it won't work—I will not be intimidated."
The Not Above the Law coalition said Tuesday that the McIver indictment is an ominous signal of what's to come as Trump wields the military and federal government to quell opposition to his mass deportation agenda and other abuses of power.
"In just the past few days, we have seen Trump target a labor leader representing hardworking Californians and a member of Congress representing her New Jersey constituents," the alliance said, referring to McIver as well as SEIU California president David Huerta.
Huerta was arrested last Friday at the site of an ICE raid in Los Angeles. The labor leader, who was released from federal custody Monday on a $50,000 bond, was charged with conspiracy to impede an officer, a felony that carries up to six years in prison.
"None of us knows who will be next," the coalition said Tuesday. "The DOJ should immediately drop these politically motivated, unwarranted charges—our justice system should not be a tool in Trump's authoritarian power grabs. Congresswoman McIver deserves justice—and so does our democracy."
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'Should Send a Chill Down the Spine of Every American': Trump DOJ Charges New Jersey Democrat
"The most corrupt administration in our country's history is targeting and punishing public officials who seek to hold them accountable."
May 20, 2025
U.S. President Donald Trump's Justice Department announced Monday that it is pursuing assault charges against a Democratic congresswoman from New Jersey who took part in an oversight visit at a privately run migrant detention center in Newark earlier this month.
In a statement, Interim U.S. Attorney for the District of New Jersey Alina Habba announced the charges against U.S. Rep. LaMonica McIver (D-N.J.), claiming the lawmaker "assaulted, impeded, and interfered with law enforcement" at GEO Group's Delaney Hall. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) awarded GEO Group a billion-dollar contract earlier this year to detain migrants there, even as the facility faced legal challenges and accusations of abuse.
McIver rejected the charges against her as "purely political," saying that "they mischaracterize and distort my actions" in an attempt to "criminalize and deter legislative oversight."
"We were fulfilling our lawful oversight responsibilities, as members of Congress have done many times before, and our visit should have been peaceful and short," said McIver. "Instead, ICE agents created an unnecessary and unsafe confrontation when they chose to arrest Mayor [Ras] Baraka."
Habba said Monday that her office has agreed to drop the trespassing charge against Baraka, who welcomed the decision while expressing solidarity with McIver.
"Congresswoman McIver is a daughter of Newark, past Newark Council president, a former student of mine, and a dear friend," said Baraka. "I want to be clear: I stand with LaMonica, and I fully expect her to be vindicated."
"It reveals the increasingly authoritarian nature of this administration and its relentless, illegal attempts to suppress any dissent or oversight."
The U.S. attorney's announcement sparked an outpouring of support for McIver and grave warnings about the implications of the Trump administration's attempt to prosecute her and other officials who try to stand in the way of its lawless mass deportation effort.
"This is a clear political attack on Rep. LaMonica McIver for having the courage to stand up to Trump's abuses of power," said Maurice Mitchell, national director of the Working Families Party. "Let's be clear who the real lawbreakers are. In just the last week, both Donald Trump and [Attorney General] Pam Bondi have been caught with a hand in the cookie jar. Bondi sold millions of shares of stock on the same day that Trump announced his disastrous tariffs. And Trump accepted a $400 million luxury plane from the Qatari royal family."
"The most corrupt administration in our country's history is targeting and punishing public officials who seek to hold them accountable," Mitchell added.
McIver's fellow congressional Democrats also rallied to her defense.
Rep. Frank Pallone Jr. (D-N.J.) called the charges a "purely political act" and said that "oversight is not a criminal offense unless you are living under a fascist regime."
The chair of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, Rep. Greg Casar (D-Texas), said that "the baseless charges against Congresswoman McIver for simply doing her job should send a chill down the spine of every American."
A group of Democrats on the House Judiciary Committee warned that "charging members of Congress for doing our jobs is a dangerous precedent to set."
"It reveals the increasingly authoritarian nature of this administration and its relentless, illegal attempts to suppress any dissent or oversight, including from judges, members of Congress, and the American people, which check lawless executive power," the lawmakers said. "Representative McIver has our full support, and we will do everything in our power to help fight this outrageous threat to our constitutional system."
The scene at Delaney Hall earlier this month was highly chaotic, with video footage showing jostling and heated verbal exchanges outside of the facility's gate as federal agents moved to arrest Baraka after three New Jersey lawmakers—McIver and Reps. Robert Menendez and Bonnie Watson Coleman—visited the inside of the detention center, which they have a right to do under federal law.
The Department of Homeland Security released a video claiming to show McIver "assaulting" an ICE agent, and one DHS official accused the Democratic lawmaker of "body-slamming" and "body-ramming" officers. McIver, who rejected the claims, said at the time that federal agents at the scene were "roughing up members of Congress."
Watson Coleman, who is 80 years old, said she was "manhandled" by ICE agents as they moved to arrest Baraka.
In a statement late Monday, Mike Zamore of the national ACLU and Amol Sinha of ACLU-NJ said that "the Trump administration's political charges against Congresswoman McIver [are] a method more suited for authoritarianism than American democracy."
"If the Trump administration can target elected officials who oppose its extreme agenda, it can happen to any one of us," they said. "We demand that they drop the charges against Rep. McIver, and we implore her fellow members of Congress to call for the same."
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