New York Gov. Kathy Hochul is demanding answers from the U.S. Department of Homeland Security over reports of three federal immigration detention projects planned across the state, the governor’s office said Monday.
According to a letter to Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin dated Sunday, Hochul cited reports that DHS wants to put in immigration detention cells in a building in Rochester that houses a daycare and federal court, as well as sites in Batavia and Newburgh.
Hochul said in the letter the public did not hear about the projects from the federal government but from press reports and procurement records.
“My long standing policy has always been that we will cooperate with law enforcement when crimes have been committed and there is a warrant for arrest or a court order, because we want our streets to be safe as well; but this unbridled aggression against law-abiding New Yorkers must stop,” Hochul wrote in the letter. “So I ask: is your Department building or expanding immigration detention facilities in New York? If so, where, to what capacity, and under what authority? And is this being done at your direction despite President Trump’s commitment that ICE enforcement operations in New York would not be expanded unless requested by the Governor?”
Hochul asked the department to provide transparency on the sites and also requested a chance to speak with Mullin on the subject.
In a statement to Spectrum News 1 DHS said in part: “Governor Hochul’s policies of not cooperating with ICE put New Yorkers in danger. When politicians bar local law enforcement from working with DHS, our law enforcement officers have to have a more visible presence so that we can find and apprehend the criminals let out of jails and back into communities. Seven of the top 10 safest cities in the United States cooperate with ICE,” said Acting Assistant Secretary Lauren Bis. “Instead of working with us, Governor Hochul is choosing to RELEASE violent criminals from her jails directly back into our communities to perpetrate more crimes and create more victims.”
A spokesperson from Hochul’s office told Spectrum News 1 in response to the DHS statement: “These claims are patently false. Governor Hochul has been very clear: New York will never be a sanctuary for dangerous criminals. We will continue working with federal authorities to target violent offenders and dangerous criminals, but we will not stand by if ICE floods our communities with agents, separates families, and turns our neighborhoods into the backdrop for a campaign of fear.”
Hochul and the Trump administration have had several disputes over immigration in the last year, including so-called sanctuary policies, threats of surges of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officers from White House border czar Tom Homan, and over the state’s new law that bans state and local law enforcement from coordinating with federal immigration enforcement for non-criminal violations.