US attorney says Baraka ‘committed trespass’ during protest of facility, which he argues opened without proper permits.
Rights groups and Democratic officials have decried the arrest of the mayor of Newark, New Jersey, during a protest at an immigration detention centre.
Mayor Ras Baraka had joined several lawmakers at the detention centre, called Delaney Hall, for a demonstration on Friday.
For weeks, he has been among those protesting the recently opened 1,000-bed centre, which critics see as a key link in President Donald Trump’s mass deportation efforts.
Those in attendance said Baraka sought to enter the facility along with members of the United States Congress on Friday, but he was denied entry.
A video reviewed by The Associated Press showed a federal official in a jacket with the logo for the Homeland Security Investigations unit telling Baraka he could not tour the facility because “you are not a congress member”.
Baraka then left the secure area, rejoining protesters on the public side of the centre’s gate. Video showed him speaking through the gate to a man in a suit. The man said, “They’re talking about coming back to arrest you.”
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“I’m not on their property. They can’t come out on the street and arrest me,” Baraka replied.
Moments later, several Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents, some wearing face coverings, surrounded the mayor and others on the public side of the gate. Baraka was dragged back through the security gate in handcuffs, while protesters yelled, “Shame!”
In a subsequent post on the social media platform X, Alina Habba, Trump’s former personal lawyer and acting US attorney for New Jersey, said Baraka had “committed trespass and ignored multiple warnings” to leave.
“He has willingly chosen to disregard the law. That will not stand in this state,” Habba wrote. “He has been taken into custody. NO ONE IS ABOVE THE LAW.”
US Representative LaMonica McIver was also at the centre on Friday, along with Representatives Bonnie Watson Coleman and Robert Menendez Jr, to conduct what they called an “oversight inspection”.
In a post on X, McIver said Baraka “did nothing wrong” and had already left the facility at the time of his arrest.
“This is unacceptable,” McIver said in the video.
For its part, a spokesperson for the Department of Homeland Security accused the lawmakers of “storming” the facility in a “bizarre political stunt”.
Baraka has said the detention centre — located in Newark, not far from New York City — opened despite not having the proper local permits and approvals. He has launched a lawsuit to halt its operations.
The GEO group, which runs the centre in coordination with ICE, has denied his claims. It entered into an agreement with the federal government in February to run the Delaney Hall facility, under a 15-year contract valued at $1bn.
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‘Unjust arrest’
Local elected officials swiftly condemned the federal agents’ actions, with the state’s governor, Phil Murphy, writing on X that he was “outraged by the unjust arrest” of Baraka.
Murphy called the mayor an “exemplary public servant who has always stood up for our most vulnerable mayors” and appealed for his release.
The governor noted that New Jersey had previously passed a law banning private immigration detention centres in the state, a Democratic stronghold, although it was partially struck down by a federal court in 2023. An appeal is ongoing.
Baraka, who is running in next month’s Democratic primary for governor, has been an outspoken critic of the Trump administration’s immigration policies.
He struck a defiant tone against the Trump administration in January, after ICE raided businesses in the city he leads.
“Newark will not stand by idly while people are being unlawfully terrorised,” he said at the time.