'They feel no weight of the law, they feel no restraint'

Masked ICE agents grab the mayor of Newark, handcuff him and haul him away

Intro by Sam Bellamy

In just another day in Trump’s America, masked federal agents in military fatigues surrounded and arrested the mayor of Newark, NJ, outside a privately operated immigration detention center Friday.

Mayor Ras Baraka’s offense — at least according to a former Republican member of Congress and high-level Trump appointee at an unrelated federal agency — was staging “an insurrection” that was “worse than 9/11.”

Well, now.

Baraka was seized by immigration agents on the public side of fencing at the facility, handcuffed and detained at another ICE facility nearby for five hours before he was released. He was charged with trespassing

The mayor was accompanied by three Democratic members of Congress from New Jersey — Bonnie Watson Coleman, LaMonica McIver and Rob Menendez — who said they’d arrived to exercise their oversight authority and inspect the center. All three speak out in the short Wall Street Journal video below, which shows the arrest.

Baraka, who alleges the center is operating without proper permits, was barred from entering the facility with the lawmakers.

The New York Times reports that in video taken by one of the protesters a federal agent can be heard saying, “Congressmen are different, congresswomen are different,” and adding, “That is the last warning. You will be placed under arrest.”

As Baraka walked back to the public side of the fence, federal agents followed him. Protestors and the lawmakers tried to protect the mayor, but the agents pushed their way through the crowd to grab him.

Tricia McLaughlin, the assistant secretary of the Department of Homeland Security, called the episode a “bizarre political stunt” and said a “mob” had tried to assault the officers as a bus of detainees was approaching.

Today, DHS officials said the three members of Congress may be arrested, too, and claimed that one of them body-slammed a female agent.

All of this prompted former Rep. Dan Bishop, now deputy director of the Office of Management Budget, to step forward and make quite the fool of himself on X.

Friday evening, he posted, “Members of Congress and the Mayor of Newark committed an insurrection at a federal detention facility in New Jersey today. Worse than 9/11.”

When another user replied with a mocking reference to federal authorities arresting Jan. 6th rioters, Bishop replied, “Hunt them down,” apparently referring to the congress members and protesters at the facility on Friday.

In an administration that values and rewards incompetence, incoherence and malevolence, it’s a wonder Bishop’s talents are limited to OMB.

Perhaps he can head of a new task force at DHS to protect us all from dangerous mayors trying to inspect facilities in their cities?