New Jersey Gov. Mikie Sherrill said Friday that “all options are on the table” when asked by The Inquirer whether she would support adding a new tax on ICE detention centers in the state.
A bill introduced in both the state Assembly and Senate last week would implement a 50% tax on the gross receipts of private detention centers in the state and send that money to a fund for immigration services in the state. It has not yet been put up for a vote in either chamber.
Sherrill expressed opposition to new U.S. Customs and Immigration Enforcement detention facilities in the Garden State and said the state can ensure the federal government is following proper legal processes as it buys up warehouses and seeks to expand confinement capacity.
The legislativeeffort is led in part by progressives who were just elected to the legislature in November — Assembly members Ravi Bhalla and Katie Brennan, both North Jersey Democrats.
On a national level, Sens. Andy Kim and Cory Booker, both Democrats, introduced legislation on Thursday that would ban President Donald Trump’s administration from purchasing or converting warehouses for immigration detention or processing.
Sherrill wrote a letter to Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem on Friday expressing her opposition to the plan, which the governor said involves housing up to 1,500 beds in a 470,000-square-foot facility that currently has just two bathrooms.
“They really just have not gone through a thoughtful process,” she said during her Gloucester County stop. “It’s going to put some pressure on the town as well, and these types of facilities have a history of not being built in a way that is safe for prisoners.”
New Jersey has existing ICE detention centers at Delaney Hall in Newark and in Elizabeth. The agency has also floated the idea of confining people at Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst.
“This is not a warehouse that’s fit for human habitation, and they say they’re putting 1,500 people in there,” she said of the Roxbury plan. “So there is a lot we can do as a state to prevent this.”
In her Friday letter to Noem, Sherrill denounced the Department of Homeland Security’s lack of transparency around their Roxbury plans — a criticism that Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro, who opposes ICE warehouse facilities in Pennsylvania, has also lodged against the agency.
Protests erupted in Roxbury after the Washington Post included it as a site that ICE was considering. Confusion later ensued after DHS, which oversees ICE, put out contradictory statements to the media over whether they were purchasing a warehouse for a detention center there.
Sherrill also told Noem in her letter that the state will “assess all options to protect the community’s infrastructure, public safety, health, and long-term economic stability,” using “every tool at our disposal.” She said the ICE detention centers in the state and elsewhere are known for “deplorable conditions,” such as overcrowding, undrinkable water, rotten food, and insufficient healthcare.
“In short, DHS’s treatment of human beings — citizen and noncitizen alike — reflects a chilling disregard for both human life and the rule of law,” she said in the letter. “New Jersey will not be complicit in this.”
The alarm bells went off for Assembly member Cody Miller when he heard about Newark schools installing artificial intelligence surveillance. The South Jersey lawmaker wants to get ahead of the technology before it spreads in his region.
Miller, a Democrat who represents parts of Atlantic, Camden, and Gloucester Counties, sponsored a bill that would require schools to develop AI surveillance policies and to communicate them to parents before using the technology and post public signage about it.
The bill passed the Assembly 78-1 on Tuesday with bipartisan support and one member not voting.
“We need guardrails,” Miller said. “And that’s really why we developed and drafted this legislation. It was in response to something that we know is going to become a part of a larger operation — most likely — as artificial intelligence becomes the new norm for things.”
Artificial intelligence surveillance is already present in South Jersey. Glassboro Public School District in Gloucester County became the first school to implement a newsystem developed by a Pennsylvania company that uses artificial intelligence to detect guns through security cameras last year, NJ.com reported.
Miller, 35, said he sees the pros and cons to AI but is concerned about student privacy and cybersecurity surrounding students’ images, campus layouts, and security protocols.
“Safety is important, but when you decide to implement something like this, you need to make sure that you’re communicating with the families and the parents, and students should also have a right to know what information is being collected on them,” the Democrat said.
The bill states that a district school board, charter school board of trustees, or renaissance school project that uses video, X-ray, or body scanner surveillance systems with AI must create a policy about using the technology and distribute it to district families.
The policy would need to include benefits and challenges of using the tool, what information will be collected, and how it will be used and accessed.
Signage would have to be posted in a “prominent, public place” where the system is used, indicating the use of AI.
If the bill becomes law as written, it would be implemented in the next school year.
Newark Public Schools announced plans to install more than 7,000 cameras with artificial intelligence capabilities in 2024 through a multimillion-dollar plan funded with COVID relief money in 2024, Chalkbeat Newark reported.
“I read it, and I went, ‘Whoa, this is a first. This is the first time I’m seeing something like this,’” said Miller, who works at Rowan College and served on the Monroe Township Board of Education.
Miller sponsored another version of the bill last session that didn’t make it to a floor vote. One of his cosponsors is Assembly member Dan Hutchison, another South Jersey Democrat who represents parts of Camden, Gloucester, and Atlantic Counties.
Sen. Linda Greenstein, a Democrat whose Central Jersey district includes parts of Mercer and Middlesex Counties, is slated to introduce a companion bill in the Senate.
The only lawmaker to vote against the bill in the Assembly was Republican Brian Bergen, who represents parts of Morris and Passaic Counties in North Jersey.
Bergen said schools are capable of figuring out their own policies and would already have policies in place for video surveillance.
“What’s the difference about AI? Your ring camera at home has AI in it,” he said.
The GOP lawmaker called the bill a “silly” example of legislators wanting “to write bills to write bills.” Bergen also questioned why it only focuses on schools and not other government buildings kids use.
“Schools have policies all over the place,” he said. “They’re local school boards. They have local control. They’re smart people.”
New Jersey Attorney General Jennifer Davenportmarked her first official day in the office Tuesday exchanging lawsuits with President Donald Trump’s administration.
Davenport, appointed by Gov. Mikie Sherrill, had already been waging legal battles against Trump as acting attorney general before her unanimous confirmation by the New Jersey Senate.
Thestate’s new top lawyer announced a lawsuit the same day against Trump’s Department of Health and Human Servicesover what she called its “rogue vaccine schedule that gambles with children’s health and lives.”
Trump’s administration also announced a lawsuit against New Jersey over a new immigration policy Davenport helped roll out that restricts ICE operations on state property.
She called the federal government’s suit a “pointless” waste of resources.
The two cases are a sign of more battles to come as Sherrill promises to fight Trump. Davenport will betasked with making sure the governor’s policies withstand a potential barrage of court battles in the months and years ahead.
DOJ sues Sherrill over her executive order limiting ICE
The Department of Justice announced Tuesday that it filed a lawsuit against Sherrill and the state over the Democratic governor’s recent executive order prohibiting ICE from conducting civil immigration enforcement without a judicial warrant in non-public areas of state-owned property, which she announced alongside Davenport.
The DOJ’s legal complaint repeatedly misspells Sherrill’s last name.
“Federal agents are risking their lives to keep New Jersey citizens safe, and yet New Jersey’s leaders are enacting policies designed to obstruct and endanger law enforcement,” U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi said in a statement. “States may not deliberately interfere with our efforts to remove illegal aliens and arrest criminals — New Jersey’s sanctuary policies will not stand.”
Davenport said Tuesday that the DOJ lawsuit is a waste and that her team looks “forward to defending this executive order in court.”
“New Jersey will continue to ensure the safety of our state’s immigrant communities,” she said.
Davenport joins lawsuit against RFK Jr.
In a lawsuit going in the other direction, Davenport announced on Tuesday that New Jerseyis joining a multi-state lawsuit against HHS, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and their leaders.
The suit challenges a January CDC memo that upended childhood vaccination recommendations. Vaccines for rotavirus, meningitis, hepatitis A, hepatitis B, influenza, COVID-19, and respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) were previously universally recommended, but are now only recommended for children under high risk of serious illness. (Parents of otherwise healthy children can still decide with their doctors to give their kids these vaccines.)
The lawsuit also focuses on HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s decision to replace members of the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices.
“This radical and unlawful overhaul of the nation’s childhood vaccine schedule rests on fringe theories and ignores decades of science,” Davenport said.
Prior to her confirmation, Davenport as acting attorney general joined another multi-state lawsuit last week against the Trump administrationfor rescinding clean energy funding that had previously been appropriated by Congress.
In New Jersey, the federal Department of Energy ended two agreements with Rutgers University, according to Davenport’s office. One, a $3.2 million award, was for energy-efficiency upgrades that would result in potential energy savings between $3.8 billion and $15.4 billion over the course of five years. The other award of $1.7 million was for research for farmers to use their land for energy production and agricultural production at the same time.
Lowering energy costs and fighting Trump were hallmarks of Sherrill’s campaign for governor and are part of her continued messaging as the state’s executive.
Davenport also sued the Trump administration with New York earlier this monthover his halting of funding for the Gateway infrastructure project between New York and New Jersey. A federal judge ordered the Trump administration to release funding for the project, and construction is moving forward as the appeal process plays out.
She has also joined multi-state coalitions condemning the Trump administration over the DOJ asking Minnesota to hand over resident data in exchange for ending the violent ICE operations there, as well as Trump’s attempt to halt funding for natural disaster response.
Sherrill and Davenport have also worked together to create a portal for people to submit videos of ICE agents in New Jersey and share information for residents to know their rights when interacting with federal immigration agents.
Who is Jennifer Davenport?
Davenport has more than 15 years of state and federal law enforcement experience, with experience at the New Jersey Attorney General’s Office, United States Drug Enforcement Administration, and the U.S. Attorney’s Office in New Jersey, where she was colleagues with Sherrill for part of her time there.
She most recently worked as deputy general counsel and chief litigation counsel for the energy company PSEG.
Davenport worked in a top role at the New Jersey Attorney General’s office in 2018 when the state first implemented the Immigrant Trust Directive, the state’s sanctuary policy that limits law enforcement cooperation with ICE and has been upheld by federal judges.
The litigator, who grew up in Wildwoodand now lives in Monmouth County, has two daughters ages 11 and 14. She graduated from DeSales University in Pennsylvania and the Seton Hall University School of Law in New Jersey.
“I am grateful to Governor Sherrill and the Legislature for the trust placed in me,” she said in a statement Tuesday. “I will serve with fairness, independence, and integrity — the same values that have guided every step of my public service.”
New Jersey lawmakers just got a nearly 70% raise when they took their oaths in January.
It’s their first pay bump in more than two decades. The state’s legislators had been paid a $49,000 salary since 2001, but this year they saw it jump to $82,000 under a law signed in 2024.
Despite the increase, their spending power isn’t any bigger than it was 25 years ago. But legislators giving themselves a raise is a politically fraught move.
Their new salaries fall below the state’s median household income of more than$100,000, though the legislature says most of its members have other employment. Garden State lawmakersare considered part-time, even though they meet throughout the year and some members say the job is a full-time commitment.
“They say it’s part-time but I would argue that people act like it’s full-time, and it really is a full-time job,” said Assemblymember Anthony Angelozzi, a newly elected Democrat who represents parts of Burlington and Atlantic Counties and also works as a Hammonton teacher and leads the Hammonton Education Association, the local teachers union.
“My term is two years, and I am in a swing district … so if I don’t work hard every day to do things in my district and to talk to people, build relationships, visit the 25 towns that I represent, I’m going to lose my seat,” he said.
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New Jersey legislators are now among the highest-paid in the country, but they’re still paid less than their counterparts in Harrisburg, whose salaries are more than $113,000, including per diems, above Pennsylvania’s median household income of roughly $78,000.
In New Jersey, each chamber was scheduled to meet for less than a dozen full sessions in 2025, but members met more frequently for committee meetings and quorums, in which lawmakers can conduct business if more than half are present.
Most New Jersey state lawmakers have other jobs, too
Along with Angelozzi, all of the other 19 state lawmakers who represent Camden, Burlington, and Gloucester Counties in the state House and Senate also received a paycheck from outside employment, according to 2024 financial disclosures. A handful of them also reported receiving Social Security or pension income.
Assemblymember Balvir Singh, a Burlington County Democrat who began his term last year, said he’s not sure he would have voted for the pay increase given the drastic jump at once, though he would have supported a formula with annual increases over time.
“I think not doing something for so many years and then doing it all of a sudden, definitely is a suspicion among people, and rightfully so,” he said.
Singh works as a public school curriculum and instruction supervisor, which gives him flexibility to plan his work hours around days he has to be in the legislature, though he still uses his time off for legislative matters and constituent services.
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Does better pay mean Trenton can better represent New Jerseyans?
Proponents of payingelectedofficials higher salaries argue thatitcan lead to a more diverse legislature that’s more representative of New Jerseyans, though the evidence is limited.
Anthony Campisi, a political consultant who works in both New Jersey and Pennsylvania, said higher legislative pay opens up the prospect of running for state office to those who aren’t independently wealthy or hold white-collar jobs, that come with the flexibility to go to Trenton regularly, like lawyers.
“I think it’s a good thing to pay legislators living wages,” he said. “They’re responsible for appropriating billions of dollars for overseeing important legislative work that impacts every aspect of our lives.”
But Peverill Squire, a national expert on legislative pay based at the University of Missouri, said pay increases lead to minimal changes in the makeup of legislatures because of the financial and time commitment that comes with running for office.
“It makes it more attractive for more people to think about, but it’s still a very difficult thing to run for office, and so in the final analysis, it doesn’t have as big an impact as one might have thought it would,” he said.
That being said, higher pay can incentivize legislators to remain in the job. Squire said state lawmakers who step down voluntarily often do so because of the financial impact on their families.
The average state legislator salary across the country hasn’t kept pace with inflation over the past few decades, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures(NCSL). In New Jersey, the old salary of $49,000 in 2001 had the buying power of roughly $90,000 today.
New Hampshire legislators receive the lowest annual salary of $100, which has not been changed since 1889. Meanwhile, New Mexico lawmakers do not receive a salary, but they receive per diems.
In 2025, only six states paid their lawmakers more than New Jersey lawmakers’ new salary of $82,000, while Pennsylvania lawmakers made the third most behind New York and California, according to NCSL data.
New Jersey Gov. Mikie Sherrill holds up a just signed executive order during her inauguration ceremony in Newark, N.J., Tuesday, Jan. 20, 2026. Sherrill will received a higher salary than her predecessor, former Gov. Phil Murphy, under a law taking effect this year.
Should New Jersey become a full-time legislature?
The 2024 law,which was signed by former Gov. Phil Murphy, also increased the salary for the governor and other public employees, including legislative staff, cabinet members, and judges.
Starting this year with Gov. Mikie Sherrill, the state’s top executive got a 20% pay increase from $175,000 to $210,000. For comparison, Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro’s salary has risen to nearly $254,000 this year.
The Office of Legislative Services estimated in 2024 that the increases altogether would bring a cost increase to the state of at least $9.8 million for 2026 and at least $12.4 million in 2027 and thereafter.
The bill faced opposition from some Republican lawmakers, including member Alex Sauickie, a Republican whose district includes parts of Burlington, Middlesex, Monmouth, and Ocean Counties. Sauickie said the billwas brought forward at a horrible time as New Jersey residents struggled with the high cost of living — an issue that persists as the law takes effect.
“We should fix the state for everybody else before we make adjustments for ourselves,” said Sauickie, whose district includes parts of Burlington, Middlesex, Monmouth, and Ocean Counties.
The GOP lawmaker said he does not believe higher wages lead to better legislators.
“Under the old salary we had questionable legislators, and out of the gate on the new salary I think we still have questions about certain legislators,” he added.
Antoinette Miles, the state director of the progressive Working Families Party, said New Jersey should have a full-time legislature with term limits, attractive pay, and limits on outside income.
“The real problem is that too many legislators are moonlighting as lawyers, lobbyists, or even at a second public job,” she said.
But even with a higher salary, the lack of job security as an elected official makes it a hard sell as an only source of employment, especially in a politically fickle district like Angelozzi’s.
“Nothing in politics is guaranteed … if I lose my job, I would have to be guaranteed to go back to my full-time day job, because, you know, I have bills to pay,” Angelozzi said.
The Upper Darby Township Council passed a resolution Wednesday to restrict cooperation with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement in response to growing concerns about the agency’s activities in the diverse township.
The 11-member council, made up entirely of Democrats, voted unanimously to pass a resolution saying the town will not use its resources to assist ICE with non-criminal immigration enforcement. But the largely symbolic resolution nearly mirrors the municipality’s existing guidelines, leading to criticism that it does not go far enough.
The resolution’s passage comes after Parady La, an Upper Darby resident struggling with addiction, died last month in a hospital while in ICE’s custody. It also follows the chaotic scenes in Minneapolis, where federal agents fatally shot Renee Good and Alex Pretti last month as President Donald Trump’s administration targeted the city with a massive immigration enforcement operation.
Those events have fueled anxiety in Upper Darby, where nearly a quarter of the population is foreign-born, compared with 15% in Philadelphia. Armed ICE agents wearing masks have become a familiar sight in the township, prompting residents to question why their community is suddenly under pressure, including high school students who held a walkout earlier this month.
Council President Marion Minick called the resolutiona chance to show immigrants in the community “they are not alone.”
“We can demonstrate through our votes and through our voices that Upper Darby Council will do everything within our legislative power to shield our residents and their families from this climate of intimidation,” he said.
The council’s resolution comes as localgovernmentsacross the country and in the Philadelphia area try to curb ICE’s impact on their residents. Last month, Haverford passed a similar measure and Bucks County ended its agreement with the agency that allowed sheriff’s deputies to act as immigration enforcement.
Council member Kyle McIntyre, a progressive community organizer who began his term last month, emphasized that the resolution is “just the start.”
“There is so much more than we can do, and we will be doing, and I make that solemn promise to the community right now,” he said before the vote.
“If we don’t do more, hold us accountable,” he added.
Kyle McIntyre, an Upper Darby Township council member, listens to residents’ comments during a township meeting on Wednesday, Jan. 21, at the Upper Darby Municipal Building in Upper Darby, Pa.
Township solicitor Mike Clarke said that police will cooperate with ICE if the agency has a criminal warrant signed by a judge.
“Local law enforcement is not supposed to be in the immigration enforcement business, and essentially that’s what this resolution is saying … but if it’s a criminal warrant, they will be involved,” Clarke said.
A list of frequently asked questions about ICE on the township’s website already stated that Upper Darby does not participate in civil immigration enforcement or ask residents their immigration status, though it does cooperate with lawfully issued criminal warrants and court orders. Township spokesperson Rob Ellis confirmed that the resolution reaffirms the town’s existing internal policy.
The lack of cooperation seems to be going both ways.
Upper Darby Mayor Ed Brown said earlier this month that ICE would no longer communicate with local police to tell them when agents are operating in the township, calling the change “scary.” ICE did not immediately respond to a request for clarity on Thursday.
Some residents at the meeting expressed concern about the reaffirmed policy getting in the way of public safety, and McIntyre later said the policy ensures anyone in Upper Darby can feel comfortable reporting crimes to the police. He said “anybody that commits a crime in Upper Darby Township will be held accountable,” regardless of immigration status.
Jennifer Hallam, who said she has worked with immigrants in Upper Darby for almost a decade, urged the council to postpone its vote and instead pursue legislation that has more teeth.
“The current resolution really just preserves the status quo,” she said.
She called for a resolution that would restrict ICE from municipal property without judicial warrants, prohibit the collection and sharing of immigration status among municipal employees, and prohibit ICE from wearing masks. Philadelphia lawmakers are attempting to ban ICE from wearing masks, though experts are split on whether the measure would be legally sound.
McIntyre said in an interview that Wednesday’s resolution puts the council’s values down on paper and provides clarity to the community, but he acknowledged that a resolution is not enforceable.
A death in ICE custody close to home
The community has been grappling with the death of La, a 46-year-old Cambodian immigrant and Upper Darby resident who, according to his widow, Meghan Morgan, struggled with addiction. La came the United States in 1981 as a refugee around the age of 2. He became a lawful permanent resident a year later but lost his legal status after committing a series of crimes over two decades, ICE said.
ICE said agents arrested La outside his home last month before he received treatment for severe withdrawal in a Philadelphia detention center. He was admitted to the hospital in critical condition, where his condition worsened and he died, the agency said.
Morgan and La’s daughter Jazmine La said they believe he was not given proper medical treatment and the Pennsylvania ACLU filed a Freedom of Information Act request surrounding his detention and death.
McIntyre last month called on Delaware County District Attorney Tanner Rouse and Philadelphia District Attorney Larry Krasner to investigate La’s death.
Rouse said at the time that Delaware County law enforcement was not involved or aware of La’s detainment when it happened, and that his office would investigate it. He said Thursday that surveillance footage showed La was detained “without violence” but that his death in Philadelphia should be addressed by “investigating authorities” in the city.
Krasner’s office declined to comment, saying it was a federal matter.
Staff writer Jeff Gammage contributed to this article.
Sue Altman showed up at a state Senate hearing in late 2019 to confront George E. Norcross III and was dragged out by state troopers. Six years later, she is using that incident as an example of why New Jersey voters should send her to Congress.
“If anything can prepare you for a dogfight that Washington politics is, it’s Jersey politics,” said Altman, one of more than 15 Democrats vying to succeed retiring U.S. Rep. Bonnie Watson Coleman in a reliably blue Central Jersey seat.
Altman, 43, recently resigned after serving for the last year as state director for U.S. Sen. Andy Kim, a South Jersey Democrat who has also challenged the state’s machine politics. Before that role, she unsuccessfully ran for Congress in 2024 in a swing district thatborders Coleman’s district.
She made a name for herself as a progressive activist in Camden, where she fought former Republican Gov. Chris Christie as the state began its takeover of the city’s public schools, vocally criticized power brokers like Norcross, and leda legal effort to abolish the county line from New Jersey ballots before Kim took it to the finish line in 2024.
“My time in Camden was extremely important, and in many ways shapes the work that I did in the state from that point forward,” she said.
WhileAltman built her progressive credentials in Camden, she has most recently lived in Lambertville andwill be relocating northeast to Bridgewater to move in with her long-term boyfriend, who lives just outside the district’s boundaries.
“I think what the electorate is hungry for and what the party needs are people who are going to challenge power,” she said. “I’ve done that my whole career.”
Altman, who grew up in Central Jersey, playedprofessional basketball in Ireland and Germany after graduating from Columbia University. She earned two master’s degrees from Oxford University before landing in Camden in 2014.
She garnered attention in the city for going back and forth with Christie for roughly six minutes at a public meeting in which they tossed a microphone in the air to each other.
Altman drew national attention that year after she was dragged out of the hearing in Trenton on a corporate tax incentive program Norcross defended,drawing a message of support from U.S. Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D., Mass.). Activists used images of the incident to bolster their argument that unelected power brokers like Norcross hold outsize influence in New Jersey, though Norcross later said he did not believe she should have been thrown out.
Camden Mayor Vic Carstarphen, a Democrat, criticized Altman for what he called her “singular focus” on “trying to tear down” Norcross during her time in Camden for her own “self-promotion.”
“She created a lot of chaos in the city, and ran amok throughout the city,” Carstarphen said Tuesday.
In 2021, Altman led the legal strategy in the first major lawsuit against the county line, the old ballot that was advantageous to party-endorsed candidates. The fall of the line has led to more competitive primaries, including her own.
She went on to unsuccessfully challengeincumbent Republican U.S. Rep. Tom Kean Jr., losing by more than five percentage points in 2024.
Altman said dealing with immigration cases while working in Kim’s office partially inspired her to run again. She said Democrats should replace U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement with “full comprehensive immigration reform” while also securing the border.
Neither Kim nor the Working Families Party has weighed in on the race.
Altman warns that the country is at “one of the most vulnerable points” in its history with Trump in office for a second time.
“We have a very short window of time to prove to the rest of the country that Democrats in power can deliver for people and hold Trump accountable, but not get overwrought with the politics of it,” she said.
Mejia will compete with Joe Hathaway, the former Randolph mayor who ran unopposed in the Republican primary, in an April special election. While Hathaway is far from supporting Mejia’s call for an end to ICE, he has also voiced support for making changes to the agency.
The encounter that has brought their views into focus happened Tuesday in Morris County. The incident, in whichan ICE agent fired a gun in Roxbury, is under investigation by the New Jersey Attorney General’s Office. The attorney general’s office said no one was injured.
The U.S. Department of Homeland Security, which oversees ICE, said the officer shot at an undocumented immigrant’s tires in self-defense during a targeted effort to detain him.
“This is a public safety issue,” Mejia said in an interview. “Abolishing ICE, to me, is the only reasonable step forward, because it is clear that ICE’s and DHS’s recruitment practices are clearly failing the American people. Their oversight and training is clearly failing the American people, and they have zero accountability.”
In Roxbury, a township of about 20,000 people, roughly 40 miles from New York City, local residents recently protested a proposed ICE facility, which Democratic politicians and the all-Republican town council alike oppose.
The township, which contains mostly Republican and unaffiliated voters, falls right outside of Sherrill’s former district, which includes other parts of the same county and has become fairly reliably blue.
Mejia said Tuesday’s confrontation raises concerns about guns going off in residential neighborhoods or near schools, and that it shows the “recklessness” of the Department of Homeland Security. She said she’s been in conversation with local Democratic officials who question DHS’s accountof the incident.
Hathaway disagrees with Mejia’s views on ICE, but he also stopped short of defending DHS when asked about Tuesday’s incident. He said in an interview that he needs more information to comment.
“I think it’s generally not a good thing when politicians try to stick our nose in and stoke the flames and politicize these kinds of things before we know the facts,” he said. “I certainly don’t want to do that in this case.”
A New York Times and Siena University poll published in late January found that a “sizable majority” of voters believe ICE “has gone too far,” while roughly half support Trump’s deportations and handling of the southern border.
DHS said the undocumented person driving the car in Roxburyhad a criminal history of drug trafficking charges, drug possession, and driving under the influence, and that a judge issued an order of removal for him in 2021. The federal agency said he “rammed into a law enforcement vehicle and weaponized his vehicle in an attempt to run an officer over” while trying to “evade arrest.”
“Following his training, the officer defensively used his firearm and shot out the tires of the vehicle to stop the threat,” an unnamed DHS spokesperson said. “Thankfully, no one was injured.” The driver was arrested and taken into ICE custody, DHS said.
The attorney general’s office requested that any witnesses share video footage of the incident. The request came right before Sherrill’s administration launched an online portal for New Jerseyans to submit videos of ICE, which she initially announced on Comedy Central’s The Daily Show. Video footage shared by bystanders contradicted the Trump administration’s account of two recent deadly shootings by federal agents in Minnesota.
Mejia argued during her campaign that ICE cannot be reformed and should be replaced with something else, such as a more efficient system of processing asylum or citizenship applications.
“I’m not calling for open borders,” she said Wednesday. “I’m not calling for the eradication of a system. I’m actually calling for the cease and desist of the violence of the occupation of American cities, of the overreach from this administration, and the erosion of constitutional protections.”
She said she believes Congress, in the short term, should stop funding ICE, reallocate funds for the agency that came as Trump’s One Big Beautiful Bill Act slashed funding for social services, stop surveilling and collecting data from Americans, and end qualified immunity for agents.
Senate Democrats blocked a funding bill for DHS Thursday amid unsuccessful negotiations with the White House to make changes to immigration enforcement operations following the shootings in Minneapolis.
Hathaway said he is “willing, absolutely, to come to the table to reform” how ICE operates, but that he also wants to see changes to sanctuary policies.
Sherrill’s administration has not provided more information about the Roxbury incident, citing an ongoing investigation.
“We recognize that matters of this nature raise concerns within our communities… it is my duty to protect the safety of residents of this state and uphold the Constitution. I will do everything in my power to fulfill this responsibility,” Acting Attorney General Jennifer Davenport said.
On Wednesday, Sherrill signed an executive order prohibiting ICE from operating on state-owned private property unless there’s a judicial warrant and launched a “know your rights” guide for residents interacting with immigration agents.
Mejia, who grew up in Elizabeth and lives in Glen Ridge in Essex County, said that as an Afro-Latina, she feels less safe during Trump’s immigration crackdown and that she takes precautions like carrying her passport or being careful where she speaks Spanish.
“It happening close to home is, of course, troubling, but this is an escalation that we have been seeing for years,” said Mejia.
U.S. Rep. Chrissy Houlahan said it’s unclear what crime the Department of Justice was trying to charge her with when a grand jury refused an indictment over a video in which she, with five other Democratic colleagues, called on service members to “refuse illegal orders.”
“The regular American people that comprised the grand jury saw this for what it was, which was kind of a spurious misuse, abuse of the power of the federal government against the people,” Houlahan, of Chester, said in an interview Wednesday.
“It’s not about me or my colleagues,” continued Houlahan, a former Air Force officer. “It’s about the fact that the Constitution allows for all of us to be treated as equals, and all of us to have the freedom to speak with freedom.”
The Justice Department investigated the six Democratic lawmakers who made the video, all of whom previously served in the military or intelligence agencies. But a Washington grand jury would not sign off on chargeson Tuesday, The Associated Press reported.
It’s a setback for President Donald Trump’s administration, which has targeted the lawmakers in a variety of ways since November, when the president claimed the video was an act of sedition.
Houlahan said none of the Democrats’ lawyers could identify what charges could have legitimately been brought against them.
“Collectively, we all, of course, have unfortunately had to secure lawyers in this process,” she said. “And to a person, none of them could come up really with what it was that we had purportedly done. And clearly the people in the grand jury saw the same thing.”
The Justice Department did not respond to a request for comment on Wednesday.
U.S. Rep. Chris Deluzio, an Allegheny County Democrat who also appeared in the video, said in an interview Wednesday he is “not surprised at all” by the grand jury’s decision.
“The fact that the Trump administration and their lawyers want to try to charge us with crimes for stating the law and saying words that they don’t like is outrageous, and of course, not something that you should be able to throw people in prison for,” said Deluzio, who served in the Navy.
In a news conference Wednesday, some of the lawmakers suggested legal action against the Trump administration is on the table.
“There will be accountability, and they should be preserving documents, preparing for what’s coming,” Deluzio said.
U.S. Rep. Chris Deluzio speaks to a large crowd in front of the Beaver County Courthouse in April 2025 wearing a hat that says “don’t give up the ship.”
Trump accused the Democratic lawmakers of sedition “punishable by death” after they posted the video in November, warning service members and intelligence workers to “refuse illegal orders.” In the video, the Democrats urged service members and intelligence professionals not to “give up the ship,” a sentiment Deluzio repeated Tuesday night.
The phrase, which Deluzio has long referenced, is a rallying cry that’s hung on the wall at the Naval Academy’s Memorial Hall.
“It’s a phrase that means a lot, and it means a lot in this moment of great stress to our country — that this thing is worth our efforts and that we should not give it up,” Deluzio said in theWednesday interview.
The Democrats did not mention any specific orders in the video, but lawmakers who appeared in the video expressed concerns at the time about strikes on boats in the Caribbean and National Guard operations in U.S. cities.
Houlahan said they continue to be concerned about “the unlawfulness of the administration.”
The video also included U.S. Sen. Elissa Slotkin (D., Mich.), a former CIA officer; U.S. Sen. Mark Kelly (D., Ariz.), a former Navy captain; U.S. Rep. Maggie Goodlander (D., N.H.), a former intelligence officer; and U.S. Rep. Jason Crow (D., Colo.), a former paratrooper and Army Ranger.
Federal prosecutors unsuccessfully tried to secure the indictment against all six lawmakers in the video, The New York Times reported. The office that pursued the case is led U.S. Attorney for D.C. Jeanine Pirro, the former Fox News personality who served as district attorney in Westchester County, N.Y., during the 1990s and early 2000s.
Grand jury rejections are extraordinarily rare, but have occurred repeatedly in recent months in Washington, as citizens who have heard the government’s evidence have come away underwhelmed in a number of cases. Prosecutors could try again to secure an indictment.
Attention on the lawmakers’ video escalated days after they initially posted it when Trump began his social media tirade in November.
“This is really bad, and Dangerous to our Country,” he wrote on his social media platform Truth Social. “Their words cannot be allowed to stand. SEDITIOUS BEHAVIOR FROM TRAITORS!!! LOCK THEM UP???”
He also shared posts from supporters calling for retribution against the Democrats, including one that said, “HANG THEM GEORGE WASHINGTON WOULD !!” and another calling them domestic terrorists.
“The fact that the president and the people around him, in hearing a reminder about the law, reacted the way they did, which is to call for our death, arrest, to try to imprison us, tells me more about them than I could ever know,” Deluzio said Wednesday.
“A normal person, a normal president, would be reminding their troops of their obligations to follow the law as well because they care about the rule of law,” he added.
Hegseth has censured Kelly for participating in the video and is trying to retroactively demote him from his retired rank of captain.
In response, Kelly is suing Hegseth to block those proceedings, calling them an unconstitutional act of retribution. During a hearing last week, the judge appeared to be skeptical of key arguments that a government attorney made in defense of Kelly’s Jan. 5 censure by Hegseth.
This article contains reporting from The Associated Press
Analilia Mejia appeared to cement victory in the Democratic primary to replace New Jersey Gov. Mikie Sherrill in Congress after her top opponent conceded Tuesday morning.
It’s a massive upset win for the progressive movement.
Mejia led the race with a razor-thin margin when former U.S. Rep. Tom Malinowski, the closest contender, conceded. The Associated Press has still not called the race five days after the election as the race remains tight, but Malinowski’s concession will enable Mejia to focus on campaigning for her April 16 contest against Republican Joe Hathaway.
The progressive, an Afro-Latina, shared a gif of Bad Bunny overwhelmed with emotion as he stood last week to receive the coveted album of the year Grammy for Debí Tirar Más Fotos — the first Spanish album to get the honor.
She delivered a victory speech a couple of hours later on a livestream that kicked off with about two dozen supporters fromunions and progressive groups chanting “abolish ICE,” “tax the rich,” and “Mejia for Congress.”
Mejia said she wants to represent “every voice” in the district and said the victory was not hers alone.
“This isn’t a race in which one individual won,” she said. “This is a race in which the community stepped up and said, ‘In this moment, what we want are real representatives who will listen to the people, who will ask questions about what is keeping you up at night, who will prioritize your interest over special interests.’”
“Analilia deserves unequivocal praise and credit for running a positive campaign and for inspiring so many voters on Election Day,” Malinowski said in a statement Tuesday.
Malinowski initially appeared to be in the lead Thursday night, which led multiple outlets and the Democratic National Committee to prematurely declare the race in his favor. Mejia picked up steam and moved ahead of him as the night went on, and publications issued retractions.
In response, Mejia shared on social media the famous 1948 photo of President Harry Truman holding up the Chicago Tribune’s erroneous “Dewey Defeats Truman” headline.
Mejia, the daughter of Colombian and Dominican immigrants, has repeatedly said that U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement cannot be reformed and should therefore be abolished as President Donald Trump’s immigration enforcement tactics become increasingly scrutinized across the country.
She said at a news conference Friday that her position resonated with voters, and that the agency “must be replaced by something that isn’t violent, that isn’t shooting Americans in the streets, that is respecting our Constitution.”
She made the case during her campaign that “any old blue just won’t do” and that she is “unbought and unbossed.”
Malinowski raised nearly three times as much as Mejia through Jan. 16, according to Federal Election Commission data.
Her victory is a major breakthrough for New Jersey’s progressive movement in what has become a fairly reliably blue district that includes parts of Essex, Morris, and Passaic Counties. It comes on the heels of a progressive victory in the crowded Jersey City mayoral race.
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Italso adds another feather to the cap of the national progressive movement after the victory of New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani, who was supported by some of the same high-profile progressives as Mejia, including U.S. Sens. Bernie Sanders (Ind., Vt.) and Elizabeth Warren (D., Mass.) and U.S. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D., N.Y.).
Sherrill, who remained neutral in the primary, said in a statement Tuesday that she endorses Mejia’s campaign to replace her seat in Congress.
“I’ve known Analilia for years — I’ve seen her dedication to expanding opportunity and fighting for working people. I know she will be a great partner in Congress whether it is fighting for the Gateway Tunnel or to protect our Constitutional rights,” Sherrill said, referencing a major infrastructure project Trump halted.
I’ve spoken with @Analilia_Mejia to congratulate her and I am very proud to endorse her campaign for Congress. I’ve known Analilia for years — I've seen her dedication to expanding opportunity and fighting for working people. I know she will be a great partner in Congress whether…
Mejia will enter the April special election as a heavy favorite against Hathaway, the former Randolph mayor who ran unopposed in the Republican primary. A regular primary will take place less than two months later, on June 2, for the midterm elections in November. That means the winner’s term will last only through this year.
The progressive, who grew up in Elizabeth, lives with her husband and two kids in Glen Ridge in Essex County, where she says she has resided for 13 years.
She said Friday that garnering name recognition was an “uphill battle” sinceshe was one of the last candidates to join the crowded race. Even though mail ballots went out before many voters had the chance to get to know her, her team made it up “by being on the ground and having the most extensive field operation possible,” she added.
Mejia has most recently worked as the co-executive director of Popular Democracy, a network of organizations across the country that call for “transformational change for Black, brown and low-income communities,” according to its website.
She has a long resumé in activism, politics, and government, including working as the national political director for Sanders’ 2020 presidential campaign, the deputy director for the U.S. Labor Department’s Women’s Bureau under former President Joe Biden, the executive director of the New Jersey Working Families Party, and a union organizer before launching her bid for the seat.
Her victory is the latest example of how the Democratic establishment in New Jersey is losing its grasp on primaries in the state.
That is largely because New Jersey redesigned its primary ballot system last year to get rid of its county line ballot. The long-held system was advantageous to candidates supported by their local party apparatus, and progressive activists like Mejia worked for years to dismantle it to give other candidates a shot.
Malinowski had the endorsement of the Morris County Democratic Committee, and the other local committees supported candidates who fell behind the two front-runners.
AIPAC’s attacks on Malinowski
A thorn in Malinowski’s side was a series of attacks funded by the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), a pro-Israel national lobbying group, on issues unrelated to Israel. The method may have backfired, since Mejia has been more critical of Israel than the former House member.
United Democracy Project, a super PAC funded by AIPAC, attacked Malinowski in ads for voting “with Trump” by supporting bipartisanlegislation that included funding for federal immigration enforcement. It also went after him for undisclosed stock trading while in Congress, for which he had received previous scrutiny.
Patrick Dorton, a spokesperson for the super PAC, told the New York Times that Malinowski is not sufficiently supportive of Israel because he has talked about putting conditions on aid for the country.
The group spent nearly $2 million on the race, according to Adimpact, which tracks TV and other spending by campaigns.
Malinowski,who generally supports Israel, said in his concession statement that the results of the race “cannot be understood” without looking at the “dishonest ads” funded by the group.
I spoke with Analilia Mejia this morning and congratulated her on her win in our primary. See my full statement below.
I will be forever grateful to everyone who supported and believed in me in this race, and in the fight for our democracy that must go on! pic.twitter.com/J7tIjgmDq1
“I wish I could say today that this effort, which was meant to intimidate Democrats across the country, failed in NJ-11,” he said. “But it did not. I met several voters in the final days of the campaign who had seen the ads and asked me, sincerely: ‘Are you MAGA? Are you for ICE?’”
He said he will oppose any candidates AIPAC backs in the June primary when the seat is again on the line.
Mejia said AIPAC’s attacks demonstrate the influence money has over American politics, but she rejected the notion AIPAC played a decisive role in the race.
“What they didn’t do is win this for us,” she said. “How we won it was people power. How we won it was talking to folks. How we won it was knocking at doors. How we won it was being ready at every moment.”
The Democratic primary to replace N.J. Gov. Mikie Sherrill in Congress remains too close to call as of Friday afternoon, but the early results already signal a major breakthrough for progressives in the state.
Analilia Mejia, a progressive who’s worked for U.S.Sen. Bernie Sanders and the Working Families Party, led former U.S. Rep. Tom Malinowski byless than 1 percentage point, with more than 91% of votes tabulatedin the crowded primary.
Some outlets, including Decision Desk, called the race for Malinowski, who dominated mail ballots, Thursday night before issuing retractions as Mejia gained ground. The Democratic National Committee had even issued a premature congratulations to the former House member before Mejia took the lead.
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Sherrill represented North Jersey’s 11th CongressionalDistrict, which includes parts of Essex, Morris, and Passaic Counties, and stepped down after being elected governor. A field of 13 Democrats competedin the special election for the open seat from various factions of the Democratic Party.
Only two broke through as serious contenders, and they represent two sides of the New Jersey Democratic Party: the establishment and progressives.
Democrats were so invested in the race, turnout exceeded the 2024 primary for the seat, which signals the high level of motivation for Democratic voters going into this year’s midterms.
Sherrill stayed neutral in the race
Analilia Mejia, center, speaks during a rally calling for SCOTUS ethics reform, May 2, 2023, in Washington.
Analilia Mejia is supported by national progressives like AOC
Mejia, 48, is the daughter of Colombian and Dominican immigrants. She has called to “abolish ICE” and spoke in both English and Spanish at a news conference Friday.
The progressive candidate has most recently worked as the co-executive director of Popular Democracy, a network of organizations across the country that call for “transformational change for Black, brown and low-income communities,” according to its website. She worked as the national political director for Sanders’ 2020 presidential campaign, the state director of the New Jersey Working Families Party, and as a union organizer before launching her bid for the seat.
Mejia was endorsed by national progressives, including Sanders (I., Vt.), U.S. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D., N.Y.) and U.S. Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D., Mass.). She also had the backing of Newark Mayor Ras Baraka, whose progressive campaign landed him in second place behind Sherrill in the six-way gubernatorial primary last year.
Mejia leaned into her underdog status Thursday night when addressing supporters, noting the race had been called for her opponent before she took the lead.
“Here’s the bottom line,” she said. “We know that our movement, this party, this moment, calls on every one of us to be big and bold and brave. And that is what we are about.”
She later declared: “I think we’ll listen to some Bad Bunny!”
Democratic Rep. Tom Malinowski, center right, arrives during his election night party in Garwood, N.J., Tuesday, Nov. 8, 2022.
Tom Malinowski was backed by the local party apparatus
Malinowski, 60, started as a freshman House Democrat alongside Sherrill in 2019 before losing his seat to Republican U.S. Rep. Thomas Kean Jr. in the 2022 election afterhe faced pushback for undisclosed stock trading and his area was redistricted to be less favorable to Democrats.
His former district is right next to the 11th District and encompasses parts of Union, Somerset, Morris, and Sussex Counties, and all of Hunterdon and Warren Counties.
He recently chaired the Hunterdon County Democratic Committee and previously worked as former President Barack Obama’s assistant secretary of state for democracy and human rights.
The Essex and Passaic County parties backed other candidates who were far behind Malinowski and Mejia.
DNC Chair Ken Martin said in the premature Thursday night statement that Malinowski has “the experience to serve New Jersey once again.”
AIPAC’s involvement in the race backfired
Malinowski faced attacks from a super PAC funded by American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), a pro-Israel national lobbying group, even though the group supported him in the past, The New York Times and other outlets reported.
Those attacks likely pulled support away from Malinowski, who is far less critical of Israel than Mejia.
Mejia called AIPAC’s tactics against Malinowski “disgusting” in a news conference on Friday and said it underscores her broader concerns about money in politics.
“Big money can actually silence voters … In many ways, I’m glad that NJ-11 voters got to see the terrible tactics so that we could reject it in the future,” she said.
The district, which used to be Republican, is now viewed as safely blue
Sherrill flipped the 11th congressional district blue as a first-time candidate in 2018, defeating Republican Assemblymember Jay Webber after the GOP incumbent retired. The incumbent, former U.S. Rep. Rodney Frelinghuysen had held the seat since 1995. The district went from leaning Republican to leaning Democratic when its lines were redrawn in 2022.
Sherrill won her last general election race for her House seat with 56.5% of the vote in 2024.
The nonpartisan Cook Political Report rates the district as solidly Democratic. Former Vice President Kamala Harris won the district decisively by nearly 9 points in 2024, but it still swung to the right from Biden’s 2020 victory in the district by almost 17 points, according to Cook data.
Joe Hathaway, the former mayor of Randolph in Morris County, was unopposed in the Republican primary.
Hathaway, 38, said in a video on social media Thursday that the election brings an opportunity for “a new generation of leadership …one focused more on the hard work than the headlines.”
He is a former aide to former Republican Gov. Christopher J. Christie and has worked in various roles in the private sector, and has branded himself as a “workhorse” throughout his campaign.
Hathaway and the winner of the Democratic primary will face off on Thursday, April 16, less than two months before the regular primary election on June 2 for the midterms.
When will the race be called, and will there be a recount?
It’s unclear when the race will be called by The Associated Press (which The Inquirer relies on for election results), but it may not be this week.
Mail ballots that were postmarked by Election Day on Thursday and received by the county Board of Election by next Wednesday can be counted in New Jersey.
Provisional ballots in the state cannot be officially counted until after the eligible mail ballots are received to ensure the voter has not voted by mail. These ballots are used in specific situations, such as when a person registered to vote moves within the county without updating their address.
Voters also have until the following Tuesday, Feb. 17, to cure a ballot flagged by election officials. This happens when there is a potential issue with a voter’s signature, which can happen when someone forgets to sign their ballot or whose signature has changed over time. The voter then has to verify their identity for their ballot to be counted.
As for a recount, New Jersey doesn’t have an automatic recount system, so a candidate would have to request one and cover the expenses. The candidate would receive a refund if the result changed.
