By Ryan Schwach<\/p>\n
The Republican-led House Judiciary Committee is singling out Queens District Attorney Melinda Katz for her refusal to hand over documents related to prosecutions under sanctuary laws. <\/p>\n
In May, the committee \u2013 which has targeted sanctuary policies in states across the country \u2013 sent a letter to Katz, asking for records regarding her office\u2019s \u201cpreferential treatment of criminal aliens to ensure that they do not face immigration consequences for their criminality.\u201d <\/p>\n
The World\u2019s Borough DA responded with a letter in June, declining to hand over any materials to the committee. <\/p>\n
\u201cLocal decisions to prosecute, or to choose not to prosecute, particular crimes of specific individuals under state law are not province of the federal government,\u201d she said in her June 10 response which was cited by the committee in a new letter sent to her on Monday. She also cited the Tenth Amendment, which protects state authority. <\/p>\n
House Judiciary Committee Chair Jim Jordan and California Representative Tom McClintock \u2013 who chairs the Subcommittee on Immigration Integrity, Security, and Enforcement \u2013 disagreed with her response, saying her arguments \u201clack a legal foundation.\u201d <\/p>\n
\u201cWe reject those arguments and reiterate our request for your cooperation,\u201d they said in their new letter. \u201cThe Committee\u2019s request for records is lawful, appropriate, and is not dependent on your office\u2019s policy preferences.\u201d <\/p>\n
Similar letters were sent in May to New York City\u2019s other four county DA\u2019s, but Katz is the only local one who received a new letter reiterating the committee\u2019s request. <\/p>\n
The committee told Katz to provide the requested materials by Sept. 7 or it \u201cmay be forced to resort to compulsory process.\u201d <\/p>\n
Katz\u2019s office did not return requests for comment. <\/p>\n
House Republicans have repeatedly challenged sanctuary policies in New York since President Donald Trump began his second term in office last year. <\/p>\n
The letters sent to the five city DA\u2019s in May also coincided with probes directed at NYPD Commissioner Jessica Tisch and Department of Corrections Commissioner Stanley Richards over their alleged lack of cooperation with Trump\u2019s immigration policies. <\/p>\n
Locals in Queens have pushed against the president\u2019s heavy-handed immigration policies amid an uptick of detentions in the borough. <\/p>\n
\u201cIt’s about cleansing,\u201d Queens Assemblymember Catalina Cruz said at a rally earlier this month. \u201cIt is about cleansing our communities of the immigrant power and love that they’re so afraid of.\u201d <\/p>\n
On Tuesday, Governor Kathy Hochul reiterated New York\u2019s policy regarding cooperation with federal immigration enforcement. <\/p>\n
\u201cHere in New York, we need local police focused on keeping our communities safe\u2014not serving as de-facto ICE agents, not conducting civil immigration enforcement, and not carrying out the Trump Administration\u2019s callous immigration agenda,\u201d Hochul said. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"By Ryan Schwach The Republican-led House Judiciary Committee is singling out Queens District Attorney Melinda Katz for her…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":330795,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[37],"tags":[9,24,63,122,124,123],"class_list":["post-330794","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-queens","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city","tag-nyc","tag-queens","tag-queens-headlines","tag-queens-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/330794","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=330794"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/330794\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/330795"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=330794"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=330794"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=330794"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}