so i guess we're arresting mayors of major cities now
May 9, 2025 1:46 PM Subscribe
mayor baraka of newark, new jersey, arrested at ice detention center he has been protesting.
witnesses said the arrest came after baraka attempted to join a scheduled tour of the facility with three members of new jersey’s congressional delegation, reps. robert menendez, lamonica mciver, and bonnie watson coleman. [...] in a statement, the department of homeland security said that the lawmakers had not asked for a tour of the facility, contrary to witnesses’ accounts. the department said further that as a bus carrying detainees was entering the facility, “a group of protestors, including two members of the u.s. house of representatives, stormed the gate and broke into the detention facility.”
witnesses said the arrest came after baraka attempted to join a scheduled tour of the facility with three members of new jersey’s congressional delegation, reps. robert menendez, lamonica mciver, and bonnie watson coleman. [...] in a statement, the department of homeland security said that the lawmakers had not asked for a tour of the facility, contrary to witnesses’ accounts. the department said further that as a bus carrying detainees was entering the facility, “a group of protestors, including two members of the u.s. house of representatives, stormed the gate and broke into the detention facility.”
Was already leaning towards voting for him in the primary for NJ governor and now I'm even more sure I want to do that.
posted by subdee at 1:52 PM on May 9 [13 favorites]
posted by subdee at 1:52 PM on May 9 [13 favorites]
At some level, I want to see more elected officials doing things that get them arrested, because if they aren't it doesn't seem like they are taking things seriously.
posted by Going To Maine at 2:03 PM on May 9 [29 favorites]
posted by Going To Maine at 2:03 PM on May 9 [29 favorites]
Good for Mayor Baraka; holding the organizations (including private companies, disgusting) detaining people accountable is exactly what I want elected officials to be doing, but that seems like a scary escalation.
posted by an octopus IRL at 2:09 PM on May 9 [11 favorites]
posted by an octopus IRL at 2:09 PM on May 9 [11 favorites]
Local news describes the circumstances a bit differently, looking even worse for ICE:
"The representatives had been allowed into a building at the facility. However, Baraka was allowed to enter the gates to the facility but wasn’t allowed into the building with the other elected representatives.
"When the representatives left the building and walked toward the gate opening, where Baraka was standing, Baraka was told he had to go outside the gate. Then, an aide to one of the congresspeople informed Baraka that ICE had talked of arresting him.
"Moments later, that is what happened."
So it's not like they grabbed him in the process of storming the gates. He'd been waiting where they told him to wait while the Congressmembers completed their visit.
My understanding is that Congress's oversight authority of federal agencies allows members to inspect ICE detention facilities on little notice. The city mayor doesn't have that authority, but he has been trying for days to serve the private owners of the facility with a summons for local code violations (another NJ Advance Media story, earlier this week). They allegedly don't have a valid certificate of occupancy and have locked entrances in a way that prevents appropriate emergency evacuation options. Which would not surprise me a single bit.
posted by actuallyquite at 2:10 PM on May 9 [28 favorites]
"The representatives had been allowed into a building at the facility. However, Baraka was allowed to enter the gates to the facility but wasn’t allowed into the building with the other elected representatives.
"When the representatives left the building and walked toward the gate opening, where Baraka was standing, Baraka was told he had to go outside the gate. Then, an aide to one of the congresspeople informed Baraka that ICE had talked of arresting him.
"Moments later, that is what happened."
So it's not like they grabbed him in the process of storming the gates. He'd been waiting where they told him to wait while the Congressmembers completed their visit.
My understanding is that Congress's oversight authority of federal agencies allows members to inspect ICE detention facilities on little notice. The city mayor doesn't have that authority, but he has been trying for days to serve the private owners of the facility with a summons for local code violations (another NJ Advance Media story, earlier this week). They allegedly don't have a valid certificate of occupancy and have locked entrances in a way that prevents appropriate emergency evacuation options. Which would not surprise me a single bit.
posted by actuallyquite at 2:10 PM on May 9 [28 favorites]
The city mayor doesn't have that authority
It's a little weird though, because the statute that gives Members of Congress authority here also gives them the authority to designate others to do oversight. Seems like "he's with me" (even if it has to be perhaps a bit more formal) is enough here. Though the specific language does say "An employee of the United States House of Representatives or the United States Senate designated by such a Member for the purposes of this section", so it would seem they would have to make him a paid aide. Still doesn't seem very hard.
posted by atbash at 2:17 PM on May 9 [7 favorites]
It's a little weird though, because the statute that gives Members of Congress authority here also gives them the authority to designate others to do oversight. Seems like "he's with me" (even if it has to be perhaps a bit more formal) is enough here. Though the specific language does say "An employee of the United States House of Representatives or the United States Senate designated by such a Member for the purposes of this section", so it would seem they would have to make him a paid aide. Still doesn't seem very hard.
posted by atbash at 2:17 PM on May 9 [7 favorites]
I'm sure he knew it was a possibility and I admire his courage.
posted by emjaybee at 2:23 PM on May 9 [7 favorites]
posted by emjaybee at 2:23 PM on May 9 [7 favorites]
making good trouble. thanks!
posted by nofundy at 2:26 PM on May 9 [6 favorites]
posted by nofundy at 2:26 PM on May 9 [6 favorites]
The Cheetoh Brigade, with no ID and wearing masks, kidnapped him.
I think it would be good for us to start unmasking these ICE terrorists.
posted by Chuffy at 2:29 PM on May 9 [9 favorites]
I think it would be good for us to start unmasking these ICE terrorists.
posted by Chuffy at 2:29 PM on May 9 [9 favorites]
Seems like "he's with me" (even if it has to be perhaps a bit more formal) is enough here.
Well, ICE and other Law Enforcement aren't known for following rules or protocol; there may have been a decision or compromise made to avoid derailing the rest of the tour.
posted by AzraelBrown at 2:44 PM on May 9
Well, ICE and other Law Enforcement aren't known for following rules or protocol; there may have been a decision or compromise made to avoid derailing the rest of the tour.
posted by AzraelBrown at 2:44 PM on May 9
Okay, now extend "everyone is arrestable" all the way up.
posted by trig at 2:45 PM on May 9 [4 favorites]
posted by trig at 2:45 PM on May 9 [4 favorites]
I think it would be good for us to start unmasking these ICE terrorists.
There are some good resources available. Facial recognition (Pimeyes) can be used to id ICE terrorists quite easily from screengrabs from videos. The question becomes where to host this information. Naming people is not doxxing, and not illegal. But any effort to do it would need to be on non-US servers and with some heavy anonymity.
posted by iamck at 3:18 PM on May 9 [3 favorites]
There are some good resources available. Facial recognition (Pimeyes) can be used to id ICE terrorists quite easily from screengrabs from videos. The question becomes where to host this information. Naming people is not doxxing, and not illegal. But any effort to do it would need to be on non-US servers and with some heavy anonymity.
posted by iamck at 3:18 PM on May 9 [3 favorites]
A network of cheap SDRs and some software could easily track their radios...
posted by wierdo at 3:33 PM on May 9
posted by wierdo at 3:33 PM on May 9
But any effort to do it would need to be on non-US servers and with some heavy anonymity.
Just add it to the blockchain... (only mostly joking.)
posted by kaibutsu at 3:38 PM on May 9
Just add it to the blockchain... (only mostly joking.)
posted by kaibutsu at 3:38 PM on May 9
Are we seeing more open resistance to ICE?
We had Wisconsin judge Hannah Dugan.
Then a crowd against ICE in Worcester.
And now a mayor and representatives in New Jersey.
posted by doctornemo at 3:42 PM on May 9 [1 favorite]
We had Wisconsin judge Hannah Dugan.
Then a crowd against ICE in Worcester.
And now a mayor and representatives in New Jersey.
posted by doctornemo at 3:42 PM on May 9 [1 favorite]
ice, like the gestapo, must be destroyed
posted by i used to be someone else at 3:48 PM on May 9 [7 favorites]
posted by i used to be someone else at 3:48 PM on May 9 [7 favorites]
It took a war to do that
posted by jy4m at 3:51 PM on May 9 [2 favorites]
posted by jy4m at 3:51 PM on May 9 [2 favorites]
There's also the footage from today of ICE agents attacking a woman with her baby.. they're edging closer and closer to the falling dominos scene from the Wachowski's V for Vendetta.... and all these pizza cutter edge lord fashies keep quoting "chaos is a ladder".
Chaos is not a ladder.
Chaos is chaos.
It works for you one season where you break through the Ardennes and have your way with the people of France. It works against you the next season when your goons are having to reheat Russian corpses in order to peel the boots from their legs. And your failure to plan, and to have things like contingency and redudancy, well, it just accumulates and accumulates.
So this day of reckoning that everyone keeps hoping for, well, I don't think it's going to turn out the way that everybody thinks it will.
Lavrenti Beria's men had their day. And after that day, it was they who were digging the ditches while Zhukov's army looked on.
posted by LeRoienJaune at 4:10 PM on May 9 [4 favorites]
Chaos is not a ladder.
Chaos is chaos.
It works for you one season where you break through the Ardennes and have your way with the people of France. It works against you the next season when your goons are having to reheat Russian corpses in order to peel the boots from their legs. And your failure to plan, and to have things like contingency and redudancy, well, it just accumulates and accumulates.
So this day of reckoning that everyone keeps hoping for, well, I don't think it's going to turn out the way that everybody thinks it will.
Lavrenti Beria's men had their day. And after that day, it was they who were digging the ditches while Zhukov's army looked on.
posted by LeRoienJaune at 4:10 PM on May 9 [4 favorites]
Surely this...
posted by AlSweigart at 4:17 PM on May 9
posted by AlSweigart at 4:17 PM on May 9
Here's my resist.bot "petition" - it's the letter I emailed my reps and you can use it (if you are a US voter) to contact your reps. Based on Jess Craven's call script.
posted by stevil at 4:18 PM on May 9 [1 favorite]
posted by stevil at 4:18 PM on May 9 [1 favorite]
making good trouble. thanks!,
... continuing a proud family tradition. I like to imagine Amiri in the hereafter going, "You see that? That's my boy."
posted by multics at 4:23 PM on May 9 [4 favorites]
... continuing a proud family tradition. I like to imagine Amiri in the hereafter going, "You see that? That's my boy."
posted by multics at 4:23 PM on May 9 [4 favorites]
Oh, also: very nice of interim US attorney for New Jersey Alina Habba to make an in-kind contribution to Baraka's gubernatorial campaign with this tweet:
posted by multics at 4:31 PM on May 9 [4 favorites]
“The Mayor of Newark, Ras Baraka, committed trespass and ignored multiple warnings from Homeland Security Investigations to remove himself from the ICE detention center in Newark, New Jersey this afternoon,”Couldn't pay somebody to write a more ringing endorsement.
[...]
“He has willingly chosen to disregard the law. That will not stand in this state. He has been taken into custody. NO ONE IS ABOVE THE LAW.”
posted by multics at 4:31 PM on May 9 [4 favorites]
I have been frustrated that Democrat Congress reps have not been getting arrested for months. If they had shown up to attempt to physically stop DOGE from trashing our government, that might have actually slowed things down, because of the publicity it would have received. But if course they left it to a Black mayor to put himself on the line.
posted by metasarah at 4:39 PM on May 9 [4 favorites]
posted by metasarah at 4:39 PM on May 9 [4 favorites]
Worth noting that Geo Group is the private contractor running this facility and ProPublica did an expose on them here.
posted by ajarbaday at 4:55 PM on May 9 [6 favorites]
posted by ajarbaday at 4:55 PM on May 9 [6 favorites]
Ras Baraka is the son of Amina and Amiri Baraka, famous radicals and poets. This thread on bluesky about him is good.
posted by adrienneleigh at 5:28 PM on May 9 [2 favorites]
posted by adrienneleigh at 5:28 PM on May 9 [2 favorites]
An Agony. As Now.
By Amiri Baraka
I am inside someone
who hates me. I look
out from his eyes. Smell
what fouled tunes come in
to his breath. Love his
wretched women.
Slits in the metal, for sun. Where
my eyes sit turning, at the cool air
the glance of light, or hard flesh
rubbed against me, a woman, a man,
without shadow, or voice, or meaning.
This is the enclosure (flesh,
where innocence is a weapon. An
abstraction. Touch. (Not mine.
Or yours, if you are the soul I had
and abandoned when I was blind and had
my enemies carry me as a dead man
(if he is beautiful, or pitied.
It can be pain. (As now, as all his
flesh hurts me.) It can be that. Or
pain. As when she ran from me into
that forest.
Or pain, the mind
silver spiraled whirled against the
sun, higher than even old men thought
God would be. Or pain. And the other. The
yes. (Inside his books, his fingers. They
are withered yellow flowers and were never
beautiful.) The yes. You will, lost soul, say
‘beauty.’ Beauty, practiced, as the tree. The
slow river. A white sun in its wet sentences.
Or, the cold men in their gale. Ecstasy. Flesh
or soul. The yes. (Their robes blown. Their bowls
empty. They chant at my heels, not at yours.) Flesh
or soul, as corrupt. Where the answer moves too quickly.
Where the God is a self, after all.)
Cold air blown through narrow blind eyes. Flesh,
white hot metal. Glows as the day with its sun.
It is a human love, I live inside. A bony skeleton
you recognize as words or simple feeling.
But it has no feeling. As the metal, is hot, it is not,
given to love.
It burns the thing
inside it. And that thing
screams.
posted by chavenet at 5:28 PM on May 9 [2 favorites]
By Amiri Baraka
I am inside someone
who hates me. I look
out from his eyes. Smell
what fouled tunes come in
to his breath. Love his
wretched women.
Slits in the metal, for sun. Where
my eyes sit turning, at the cool air
the glance of light, or hard flesh
rubbed against me, a woman, a man,
without shadow, or voice, or meaning.
This is the enclosure (flesh,
where innocence is a weapon. An
abstraction. Touch. (Not mine.
Or yours, if you are the soul I had
and abandoned when I was blind and had
my enemies carry me as a dead man
(if he is beautiful, or pitied.
It can be pain. (As now, as all his
flesh hurts me.) It can be that. Or
pain. As when she ran from me into
that forest.
Or pain, the mind
silver spiraled whirled against the
sun, higher than even old men thought
God would be. Or pain. And the other. The
yes. (Inside his books, his fingers. They
are withered yellow flowers and were never
beautiful.) The yes. You will, lost soul, say
‘beauty.’ Beauty, practiced, as the tree. The
slow river. A white sun in its wet sentences.
Or, the cold men in their gale. Ecstasy. Flesh
or soul. The yes. (Their robes blown. Their bowls
empty. They chant at my heels, not at yours.) Flesh
or soul, as corrupt. Where the answer moves too quickly.
Where the God is a self, after all.)
Cold air blown through narrow blind eyes. Flesh,
white hot metal. Glows as the day with its sun.
It is a human love, I live inside. A bony skeleton
you recognize as words or simple feeling.
But it has no feeling. As the metal, is hot, it is not,
given to love.
It burns the thing
inside it. And that thing
screams.
posted by chavenet at 5:28 PM on May 9 [2 favorites]
(Before someone jumps on me about it: Amiri Baraka, in particular, was Extremely Problematic, and had massive issues wrt misogyny and homophobia. He was by no means an unmixed bag, as a person. )
posted by adrienneleigh at 5:29 PM on May 9 [2 favorites]
posted by adrienneleigh at 5:29 PM on May 9 [2 favorites]
Goddamn if this keeps up ICE is gonna shoot someone protesting. Imagine if the crowd had rushed the fence to try and stop this. Someone would have gotten shot point-blank and it would have been a giant fucking mess.
posted by egypturnash at 5:35 PM on May 9
posted by egypturnash at 5:35 PM on May 9
> ras baraka is the son of amina and amiri baraka
omg this is incredible. i should have put it together from the last name but i 100% didn't!
posted by Sperry Topsider at 5:37 PM on May 9
omg this is incredible. i should have put it together from the last name but i 100% didn't!
posted by Sperry Topsider at 5:37 PM on May 9
"Four dead in Ohio"
posted by Windopaene at 5:44 PM on May 9 [1 favorite]
posted by Windopaene at 5:44 PM on May 9 [1 favorite]
« Older I am always amused, surprised and happy that punk...
posted by Flight Hardware, do not touch at 1:48 PM on May 9 [8 favorites]