In the everyday chaos that characterizes President Donald Trump’s America, the news cycle changes faster than most of us can keep up with it.
But can we please pause for a moment and consider the gravity ofwhat happened to Nekima Levy Armstrong at the hands of the U.S. government? She led a group of activists who interrupted a worship service in Minnesota on Jan. 18. The demonstrators went to Cities Church in St. Paul to stage a protest in support of immigrant rights.
The choice of venue was very much intentional: One of the leaders at the church is an administrator at a local U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement office. Four days later, Levy Armstrong, a half dozen other protesters, and two journalists were arrested.
Afterward, while she was still in custody, Trump administration officials released an AI-manipulated image of her on X, the social media site formerly known as Twitter, on accounts for Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem and the White House.
The doctored image shows Levy Armstrong (no relation) with her mouth open as if she’s sobbing hysterically. Her face also appears to have been darkened. The photo caption reads: “ARRESTED far-left agitator Nekima Levy Armstrong for orchestrating church riots in Minnesota.”
It wasn’t a riot. Nor was she crying. But all that is beside the point. The Trump administration officials wanted to make her look bad, even if it meant reshaping reality to do so. What’s especially concerning is the dishonest way it went about it. According to photos and video of her arrest, Levy Armstrong maintained a mostly impassive expression on her face throughout the ordeal.
On Jan. 22, the White House posted an AI-altered image of Nikema Levy Armstrong on the White House’s official X feed. The altered image makes Levy Armstrong appear as crying, the original image shows no such emotion.
A lot of people might see the digitally altered image of her sobbing and assume that because it was posted on a verified social media channel from the highest levels of government, it is an accurate representation of what happened — when it’s anything but.
A New York Times analysis concluded that the photo had been manipulated — something the White House admits to doing, and is unrepentant about. The manipulated photo is a meme, according toWhite House spokesperson Kaelan Dorr, who doubled down on X, saying, in part: “Enforcement of the law will continue. The memes will continue.”
No one should be surprised at that reaction, considering how many questionable AI images Trump has shared. (And, although it wasn’t artificial intelligence, don’t get me started on his racist post about the Obamas earlier this month.)
He once posted an AI video of himself — with a crown on his head — flying a plane that dumps feces onto “No Kings” protesters. It was even more disturbing when he released a deepfake video of former President Barack Obama, who seems to live rent-free inside Trump’s head, being arrested in the Oval Office.
Imagine the uproar if another president had done such a thing. Many people have normalized this kind of corrosive behavior so much that Teflon Don usually gets off with a shrug. But those of us who care about accountability have to keep calling him out.
Dirty politics are one thing, but when Trump administration officials manipulated the photo of Levy Armstrong, a private citizen, it made my blood boil. It’s another reminder that there’s no bottom with Trump when it comes to how low he will go, and that’s really scary.
I recently had a chance to speak with Levy Armstrong, and can report that, despite the administration’s efforts, she is unbowed and unbroken.
She called the government’s use of the fake image “horrifying and deeply disturbing,” and insists “I was cool, calm, and collected” during the arrest.
“I guess because they didn’t see me broken, they needed to manufacture an image of me broken,” Levy Armstrong told me.
“This is not unlike what has happened historically to Black people with all of the Sambo imagery and the mammy imagery that’s out there, with exaggerated features and darkened skin,” she said. “That’s the same thing that I went through, and that’s what they did to me. Not to mention making me look hysterical.”
She added that “I felt caricaturized, just like our people have been during slavery and Jim Crow.”
While I had her on the phone, I also asked Levy Armstrong about the arrest of former CNN anchor Don Lemon, who covered the protest she organized.
Journalist Don Lemon speaks to the media outside the U.S. District Courthouse in St. Paul, Minn., on Feb. 13.
Levy Armstrong disputes MAGA claims that Lemon was a participant in the demonstration, as opposed to being an observer. Levy Armstrong told me, “I just think it’s foolishness that they would try to rope him in as a protest organizer.”
“He’s not an activist. He’s not an organizer,” she pointed out. “He’s not a protester whatsoever.”
The former law professor said that referring to Lemon as an organizer was an excuse to attack him, as well as Georgia Fort, an Emmy Award-winning independent Black journalist based in Minnesota, who also faces federal charges after covering the protest.
Minnesota-based independent journalist Georgia Fort speaks to reporters and supporters outside the federal courthouse in St. Paul, Minn., on Feb. 17, after pleading not guilty over her alleged role in a protest that disrupted a Sunday service at a Southern Baptist church in St. Paul.
I’ve covered many protests throughout my journalism career, and find what happened particularly upsetting. Republicans talk a good game about upholding the Constitution, but the arrests were clearly an attempt to keep journalists from exercising their First Amendment right to freedom of the press.
Meanwhile, no arrests have been made in the fatal shootings by Border Patrol and ICE, respectively, last month of Alex Pretti, an intensive care nurse, or Renee Good, a mother of three.
But Levy Armstrong has been charged for her role in a disruptive but peaceful protest inside a church during which no one was physically harmed. (And, yes, although they are rare, demonstrations in churches happen. During the civil rights movement, demonstrators would hold “kneel-ins” to protest segregated churches in the Jim Crow South.)
An ordained minister, Levy Armstrong told me she draws strength from such icons of the civil rights movementas Fannie Lou Hamer, Rosa Parks, and the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., all of whom had suffered the indignity of being arrested while fighting for their basic human rights.
“Everybody needs to wake up,” she said. “This is not just about immigration. This is about our constitutional rights. This is about our democracy. This is about our freedoms.”
Freedoms we stand to lose if we allow the Trump administration to try and silence us the way it has attempted to do with Lemon, Fort, and Levy Armstrong, among so many others.
Levy Armstrong has nothing but praise for Philadelphia District Attorney Larry Krasner, who is vocal about prosecuting ICE agents who run afoul of the law. Her suggestion for concerned Philadelphians? “Get some whistles,” she said. “Get some people organized. Hold your elected leaders accountable.”
Mayor Cherelle L. Parker’s administration last August told the U.S. Department of Justice that Philadelphia remains a “welcoming city” for immigrants and that it had no plans to change the policies the Trump administration has said make it a “sanctuary city,” according to a letter obtained by The Inquirer through an open-records request.
“To be clear, the City of Philadelphia is firmly committed to supporting our immigrant communities and remaining a welcoming city,” City Solicitor Renee Garcia wrote in the Aug. 25, 2025, letter. “At the same time, the City does not maintain any policies or practices that violate federal immigration laws or obstruct federal immigration enforcement.”
Garcia sent the letter last summer in response to a demand from U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi that Philadelphia end its so-called sanctuary city policies, which prohibit the city from assisting some federal immigration tactics. Bondi sent similar requests to other jurisdictions that President Donald Trump’s administration contends illegally obstruct immigration enforcement, threatening to withhold federal funds and potentially charge local officials with crimes.
Although some other cities quickly publicized their responses to Bondi, Parker’s administration fought to keep Garcia’s letter secret for months and initially denied a records request submitted by The Inquirer under Pennsylvania’s Right-To-Know Law.
The city released the letter this week after The Inquirer appealed to the Pennsylvania Office of Open Records, which ruled that the Parker administration’s grounds for withholding it were invalid.
The letter largely mirrors Parker’s public talking points about immigration policy, raising questions about why her administration sought to keep it confidential.
But the administration’s opaque handling of the letter keeps with the approach Parker has taken to immigration issues since Trump returned to office 13 months ago. Parker has vowed not to change immigrant-friendly policies enacted by past mayors, while avoiding confrontation with the federal government in a strategy aimed at keeping Philadelphia out of the president’s crosshairs as he pursues a nationwide deportation campaign.
Although U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers operate in the city, Philadelphia has not seen a surge in federal agents like the ones Trump sent to Minneapolis and other jurisdictions.
A spokesperson for the Justice Department did not respond to a request for comment.
Immigrant advocates have called on Parker to take a more aggressive stand against Trump, and City Council may soon force the conversation. Councilmembers Rue Landau and Kendra Brooks have proposed a package of bills aimed at further constricting ICE operations in the city, including a proposal to ban law enforcement officers from wearing masks. The bills will likely advance this spring.
Advocates and protesters call for ICE to get out of Philadelphia in Center City on January 27, 2026.
Parker’s delicate handling of immigration issues stands in contrast to her aggressive response to the Trump administration’s removal last month of exhibits related to slavery at the President’s House Site on Independence Mall.
The city sued to have the panels restored almost immediately after they were taken down. After a federal judge sided with the Parker administration, National Park Service employees on Thursday restored the panels to the exhibit in a notable win for the mayor.
Bondi’s letter, which was addressed to Parker, demanded the city produce a plan to eliminate its “sanctuary” policies or face consequences, including the potential loss of federal funds.
“Individuals operating under the color of law, using their official position to obstruct federal immigration enforcement efforts and facilitating or inducing illegal immigration may be subject to criminal charges,” Bondi wrote in the letter, which is dated Aug. 13. “You are hereby notified that your jurisdiction has been identified as one that engages in sanctuary policies and practices that thwart federal immigration enforcement to the detriment of the interests of the United States. This ends now.”
“Sanctuary city” is not a legal term, but Philadelphia’s policies are in line with how the phrase is typically usedto describe jurisdictions that decline to assist ICE.
Immigrant advocates have in recent years shifted to using the label “welcoming city,” in part because calling any place a “sanctuary” is misleading when ICE can still operate throughout the country. The newer term is also useful for local officials hoping to evade Trump’s wrath, as it allows them to avoid the politically hazardous “sanctuary city” label.
Philly’s most notable immigration policy is a 2016 executive order signed by then-Mayor Jim Kenney that prohibits city jails from honoring ICE detainer requests, in which ICE agents ask local prisons to extend inmates’ time behind bars to facilitate their transfer into federal custody. The city also prohibits its police officers from inquiring about immigration status when it is not necessary to enforce local law.
Renee Garcia, Philadelphia City Solicitor speaks before City Council on Jan 22, 2025.
Garcia wrote in the August letter that Kenney’s order “was not designed to obstruct federal immigration laws, but rather to clarify the respective roles of the Police Department and the Department of Prisons in their interactions with the Department of Homeland Security when immigrants are in City custody.” The city, she wrote, honors ICE requests when they are accompanied by judicial warrants.
Immigration enforcement is a federal responsibility, and — in a case centered on Kenney’s order — the Philadelphia-based U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit ruled in 2019 that cities do not have to assist ICE.
The court, Garcia wrote, “held that the federal government could not coerce Philadelphia into performing immigration tasks under threat of federal repercussions, including the loss of federal funds.”
City loses fight over records
In Pennsylvania, all government records are considered public unless they are specifically exempted from disclosure under the Right-To-Know Law. In justifying its attempt to prevent the city’s response to the Trump administration from becoming public, the Parker administration cited two exemptions that had little to do with the circumstances surrounding Garcia’s letter.
First, the administration argued that the letter was protected by the work product doctrine, which prevents attorneys’ legal work and conclusions from being shared with opposing parties. Given that the letter had already been sent to the federal government — the city’s opponent in any potential litigation — the doctrine “has been effectively waived,” Magdalene C. Zeppos-Brown, deputy chief counsel in the Pennsylvania Office of Open Records, wrote in her decision in favor of The Inquirer.
“Despite the [city’s] argument, the Bondi Letter clearly establishes that the Department of Justice is a potential adversary in anticipated litigation,” Zeppos-Brown wrote.
Second, the city argued that the records were exempted from disclosure under the Right-To-Know Law because they were related to a noncriminal investigation. The law, however, prevents disclosure of records related to Pennsylvania government agencies’ own investigations — not of records related to a federal investigation that happen to be in the possession of a local agency.
“Notably, the [city] acknowledges that the investigation at issue was conducted by the DOJ, a federal agency, rather than the [city] itself,” Zeppos-Brown wrote. “Since the DOJ is a federal agency, the noncriminal investigation exemption would not apply.”
Garcia’s office declined to appeal the decision, which would have required the city to file a petition in Common Pleas Court.
“As we stated, the City of Philadelphia is firmly committed to supporting our immigrant communities as a Welcoming City,” Garcia said in a statement Wednesday after the court instructed the city to release the letter. “At the same time, we have a long-standing collaborative relationship with federal, state, and local partners to protect the health and safety of Philadelphia, and we remain [in] compliance with federal immigration laws.”
Staff writers Anna Orso and Jeff Gammage contributed to this article.
Federal authorities in New Jersey have violated dozens of judicial orders in recent months as immigration cases have surged in the courts, the Justice Department acknowledged in a court filing, including by transferring some detained immigrants to other jurisdictions and, in one instance, improperly deporting a man to Peru.
The admissions came in a declaration filed by Associate Deputy Attorney General Jordan Fox, who has recently been helping lead the U.S. Attorney’s Office in New Jersey, and who is also a top adviser to Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche.
Fox issued her declaration in response to an order from U.S. District Judge Michael Farbiarz, who has been overseeing a lawsuit from an immigrant challenging his detention. Farbiarz was frustrated that Immigration and Customs Enforcement had transferred the man to another jurisdiction — despite the judge’s order to keep him in New Jersey.
So earlier this month, court records show, Farbiarz directed prosecutors to review similar immigration lawsuits filed in the state’s federal courts since December and “enumerate each instance in which the Respondents or people acting on their behalf violated an order issued by a judge of this district.”
Fox, in her response filed last week, said her office had identified 547 such cases — known as habeas petitions — filed since early December. And in 56 instances, the declaration said, prosecutors did not comply with a judicial order.
Some concerned lawyers’ behavior, the document says, including six instances in which attorneys missed filing deadlines, and 10 cases in which government attorneys did not provide complete discovery.
But others outlined ways in which federal authorities handled immigrants in custody. In 17 instances, Fox wrote, ICE or other federal authorities transferred immigrants in detention after judges had ordered them not to be moved.
Fox wrote that each of those mistakes “occurred inadvertently,” because of either communication delays or “administrative oversight,” and that prosecutors in each case had agreed to return the petitioner to New Jersey.
In December, court records show, ICE also “erroneously removed” a man and deported him to Peru despite a judicial injunction prohibiting his removal.
Fox wrote that the deportation “occurred due to an inadvertent administrative oversight by the local ICE custodian.” She said that authorities worked with the man’s lawyer to try to arrange his return to the United States, but that he “decided to remain in Peru instead.”
Farbiarz, the judge, responded in a filing Tuesday by crediting Fox and her staff for providing thorough answers to his questions.
Still, he wrote, he was concerned that the violation he observed in his case was apparently “not fully an outlier.”
“Judicial orders,” he wrote, “should never be violated.”
He instructed the Justice Department to file an affidavit “detailing the procedures that are in place (or that will be put in place in the near-term) to ensure that court orders issued by district judges in New Jersey are timely and consistently complied with.”
The contentious national discussion over the rapid expansion of ICE came to the doorstep of the Philadelphia region on Wednesday, as the Bucks County commissioners voted to oppose having any processing or detention facilities in the county.
Commissioners said they learned that the federal government had recently approached warehouse owners in two communities, Bensalem Township and Middletown Township, about possible conversions. Neither owner is going forward, they said.
The commissioners voted 3-0 ― including the board’s lone Republican ― to approve a resolution that said such a center would be harmful for county residents and the people who would be confined there.
ICE officials did not immediately reply to a request for comment.
The commissioners voted a day after U.S. Rep Brian Fitzpatrick said that he would oppose such a facility ― and that he had received federal assurances none was planned in his district, which covers Bucks County and parts of eastern Montgomery County.
Fitzpatrick, a Republican who is seeking reelection in the purple district, faces a likely November challenge from Democratic Bucks County Commissioner Bob Harvie, who also opposes ICE sites.
In Doylestown on Wednesday, Commissioner Gene DiGirolamo, a Republican who serves with two Democrats, said he heard about the federal interest in two local sites and strongly disapproved.
Jake Didinsky of Southampton, said he opposes ICE warehouses in his county, comparing them to Japanese interment camps.
“Bucks County is not a county that needs or wants a detention facility,” he said.
Harvie, the board’s vice chair, said Bucks County “is no place for these kinds of facilities” and cautioned: “We have been down this road before, with Japanese Americans. And with Italian Americans.”
During World War II the U.S. government forcibly incarcerated thousands of people of Japanese descent, holding them in concentration camps mostly in the western part of the country. About two-thirds of those confined were American citizens.
Some Italian Americans endured the same treatment.
A resolution conveys the opinion and wishes of the board, but holds no force of law.
The Bucks resolution said the county opposes “the use of warehouses or similar industrial facilities not intended for human occupancy as facilities to hold, jail, detain, house or otherwise store human beings.”
In addition to humanitarian concerns, the resolution says, “such facilities, being hastily erected in areas and structures not intended for human occupation, would place unanticipated demands upon water and sewer systems, creating hazards to public health, as well as heaping new strain upon public safety services.”
The vote came as the growth of ICE leasing and purchases has become contentious in Pennsylvania and across the United States.
U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement expects to spend $38.3 billion to acquire warehouses around the country and retrofit them into immigrant detention centers to hold tens of thousands of people, the Washington Post reported. The newspaper analyzed agency documents that were provided to New Hampshire’s governor and published on the state’s website.
ICE intends to buy and convert 16 buildings to serve as regional processing centers, each holding 1,000 to 1,500 immigrant detainees. An additional eight detention centers would hold 7,000 to 10,000 detainees and serve as primary sites for deportations.
Last week Gov. Josh Shapiro formally asked Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem in a letter to reconsider the conversion of the Berks and Schuylkill sites, citing “real harms” to the communities.
He questioned the legality of the facilities and hinted at a possible lawsuit, saying if DHS goes forward, his administration will “aggressively pursue every option to prevent these facilities from opening.”
DHS spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin confirmed the plans for the Pennsylvania sites, saying that they would undergo community-impact studies and a rigorous due-diligence process, and that they would bring 11,000 jobs to the two Pennsylvania communities.
The two sites would hold a combined 9,000 people.
On Tuesday, Fitzpatrick’s office said it had received assurances from DHS and ICE that they had no plans or intention to open a detention facility within the First Congressional District.
“After hearing from concerned residents, our office immediately contacted U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, and we have received assurances that no such facility is planned,” Fitzpatrick said.
Within the serpentine halls and stairways of Olivet Covenant Presbyterian Church, congregants have established several private, off-limits rooms ― each a potential last-stand space where members would try to shield immigrants from ICE, should agents breach the sanctuary.
Church leaders call them Fourth Amendment areas, named for the constitutional protection against unreasonable search and seizure. The plan would be to stop ICE officers at the thresholds and demand proof that they carry legal authority to make an arrest, such as a signed judicial warrant.
“It’s a protective space,” said the Rev. Peter Ahn, pastor of the Spring Garden church. “While you’re here, you’re safe, is what we want to assert.”
Could it come to that? A pastor confronting armed Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents in the hallway of a church?
It’s impossible to know. But across Philadelphia, churches, community groups, immigration advocates, and block leaders are actively preparing for the time ― maybe soon, maybe later, maybe never ― that the Trump administration deploys thousands of federal agents. People say they must be ready if the president tries to turn Philadelphia into Minneapolis ― or Los Angeles, Chicago, or Washington, D.C.
People participate in an anti-ICE protest outside of the Governors Residence on Feb. 6, in St. Paul, Minn.
Know-your-rights trainings are popping up everywhere, often to standing-room-only attendance, and ICE-watch groups are abuzz on social media.
The First United Methodist Church of Germantown held a seminar last week to learn about nonviolent resistance, “so that we will be ready for whatever comes,” said senior pastor Alisa Lasater Wailoo.
“That may mean putting our bodies in the path to protect other vulnerable bodies,” she said. “We’re seeing that in Minnesota.”
In Center City, Temple Beth Zion-Beth Israel has ordered 300 whistles ― portable and efficient tools to immediately alert neighbors to ICE presence and warn immigrants to seek safety.
“There was a sense of needing to support our neighbors if it comes down to it,” said Rabbi Abi Weber. “God forbid, should there start to be ICE raids in our neighborhood, people will be prepared.”
In other places around the country, immigrant allies have similarly readied themselves for ICE’s arrival, and organized to react in concert when agents show up.
In Washington state, the group WA Whistles has distributed more than 100,000 free whistles to create what it calls “an immediate first line of community defense.” Chicago residents set up volunteer street patrols to warn immigrants of ICE and to contact family members of those detained. In Los Angeles, people raised money to support food-cart vendors, and organized an “adopt a corner” program to protect day laborers who seek work outside Home Depot stores.
A small sign at the Olivet Covenant Presbyterian Church, where the Rev. Peter Ahn is creating space to shield immigrants if necessary.
The agency’s Philadelphia office serves as headquarters not just for the city but for all of Pennsylvania and for Delaware and West Virginia as well. Arrests take place every day in the Philadelphia region.
“You all seem to be ‘preparing’ for something that’s already happened,” veteran activist Miguel Andrade wrote on Facebook.
What has changed, however, is the dramatic escalation in ICE enforcement, particularly visible in Democratic-run cities like Minneapolis, where agents fatally shot two U.S. citizens in January.
ICE detained 307,713 people across the country in 2025, a 230% increase over the 93,342 in 2024. What federal immigration agencies record as detentions closely mirror arrests.
For immigrants who have no legal permission to be in the U.S. ― an estimated 14 million people ― the rising ICE presence steals sleep and peace of mind. They know not just that they could be arrested and deported at any moment, which has always been true, but also that the U.S. government is expending vast resources to try to make that happen.
A woman who came to Philadelphia from Jamaica last year, and who asked not to be identified because she is undocumented, said she rarely leaves her home. She said she steps outside only to go to the grocery store, a doctor, or an attorney.
She recently asked her daughter to check something on the computer, and the girl balked ― afraid to even touch the machine, worried that ICE could track her keystrokes and identify their location, the woman said.
“How can I tell her it’s going to be OK when I don’t know it’s going to be OK?”asked the woman, who came to the U.S. to escape potential violence in Jamaica. “You come here expecting freedom, but here it’s like you’re in jail except for the [physical] barriers of the four walls.”
Some say President Donald Trump doesn’t want to ruin the summer celebration of the nation’s 250th birthday, or spoil the grandeur of the World Cup or Major League Baseball’s All-Star Game. Others suggest that he might be timing an ICE deployment to do exactly that.
City Council President Kenyatta Johnson speaking at the City Council’s first session of the year Jan. 22. He said this month that it’s time to stand up for immigrants in Philadelphia. “It’s my responsibility to step up in this space and be more vocal,” he said.
Trump told NBC News this month that he is “very strongly” looking at five new cities.
Some people are not waiting to see if Philadelphia is on the list.
The monthly Zoom meeting of the Cresheim VillageNeighbors usually draws about 20 people. But a hundred logged on in January to hear a presentation: What to do if/when ICE comes to our neighborhood.
The short advice: If it happens, get out your phone and hit “record.”
“If I see ICE agents, I will film,” said neighbors group coordinator Steve Stroiman, a retired teacher and rabbi. “I have a constitutional right to do that.”
Federal immigration enforcement agents shatter a truck window and detain two men outside a Home Depot in Evanston, Ill., on Dec. 17, 2025.
In a sliver of University City, Miriam Oppenheimer has helped lead three block meetings where neighbors gathered to discuss how they would respond.
They set up a Signal channel so people can communicate. And they formulated a loose plan of action: People will come outside their homes and take video recordings ― and try to get the names and birth dates of anyone taken into custody, so they can be located later.
“Courage is contagious,” Oppenheimer said. “Everybody is waiting for somebody else to do something, but we have to be the ones.”
Inside Olivet Covenant Presbyterian Church, doorways to some rooms now bear black-and-white signs that say, “Staff and authorized personnel only.”
Issues around ICE access to churches have become more urgent since Trump rescinded the agency policy on “sensitive locations,” which had generally barred enforcement at schools, hospitals, and houses of worship.
Legal advocates such as the ACLU say ICE agents can lawfully enter the public areas of churches, including the sanctuaries where people gather to worship. But to go into private spaces they must present a warrant signed by a judge.
“There are many front lines right now,” said Ahn, the Olivet pastor. “We’re not trying to be simply anti-ICE, or anti-anybody. We’re just trying to be for the rights of the Fourth Amendment.”
Staff writer Joe Yerardi contributed to this article.
I was cranking out the newsletter in Tuesday’s predawn darkness when we learned that the Rev. Jesse Jackson Sr., who’d been our greatest living bridge to the civil rights heroics of the 1960s and ‘70s, had died at age 84. Covering his groundbreaking 1984 campaign as a cub reporter at the Birmingham News is still a career highlight four-decades-plus later — a memory that was reinforced recently listening to Abby Phillip’s excellent new book on Jackson. He leaves us right when his victories for African Americans in arenas such as corporate hiring and college admissions are under attack, and it challenges us to fight to preserve them. RIP to an American original.
How ICE protest by ‘an average Joe’ from Haddon Heights went viral
“I never want to see a child run away from our own government again,” said this self-described first-time protester, Joseph Zobel from Haddon Heights, at a rally in Lindenwold, N.J., the day after children ran from a school bus stop after ICE appeared to conduct an operation in the area.
Last Friday, “an average Joe who grew up in Haddon Heights” named Joseph Zobel was at work when he saw a viral video from the nearby South Jersey town of Lindenwold that shocked the nation, and shocked him.
The clip from a Ring doorbell camera showed a gaggle of fourth and fifth graders running in a panic, screaming, “ICE! ICE!” as masked federal immigration agents had approached their morning bus stop the day before.
“I just thought, ‘How can that be happening here in the United States?’” Zobel told me Monday in his first media interview, conducted by email. When he got home from work, he saw online that the group Cooper River Indivisible was holding an “ICE Out” protest at the Lindenwold municipal building at 4 p.m.
He looked at the clock. It was 3:58.
“Something inside of me said, ‘Go up there and stand with these people,’” said Zobel, a 36-year-old school coach who said he’s never been to a protest before in his life. “I wanted to stand for what is right.” As he dashed out, Zobel also grabbed one thing — the American flag he flies in front of his house most of the time (except during football season, when an Eagles flag replaces it).
As many as 300 people were at the protest, as Indivisible organizer Amber Clemments asked the flag-bearing Zobel if he’d be willing to film a video. Zobel’s raw emotion, choking back tears as he said, “I watched fourth- and fifth-grade kids run away from our own government,” soon ignited across social media over the long Presidents Day weekend.
By Tuesday morning, the 47-second clip of Zobel had been watched an astronomical 2.9 million times on TikTok — and liked by some 709,000 viewers — even as it also went viral on Bluesky, X, Threads, and other social media platforms.
It’s not hard to understand why. Zobel, who described himself as a patriotic regular voter but never very political, instantly became the bearded, baseball hat-wearing, anguished face of a new American majority — an Everyman shocked into action by the horror of immigration raids, wondering how best to protect his neighbors.
The two South Jersey viral videos — the one depicting the raid itself and Zobel’s raw reaction — revealed how both the terrorizing tactics of masked immigration cops and the powerful reaction from often nonpolitical Americans, dubbed “neighborism,” are spreading far beyond the Minnesota tundra where this battle was initially met.
Indeed, local activists say Lindenwold — last stop on the heavily traveled PATCO line, just over 15 miles southeast of Philadelphia — has been under a relentless siege from U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and other federal agents since last spring, not long after Donald Trump became president. The transit hub has become a magnet for immigrants in recent years, with a local school population that is just under 60% Latino.
Craig Strimel, a leader of Cooper River Indivisible, a local chapter of the group that organized the large “No Kings” protests, said activists first learned of the ICE activity when a Lindenwold immigrant couple escaped agents last year by taking refuge in the local high school, where the principal blocked the feds at the doorway. Since then, Strimel said, ICE watchers have seen frequent activity in and around a cluster of five apartment complexes with large immigrant populations, but few known arrests.
“It was becoming apparent early on that this was all about creating terror,” said Strimel of the frequent ICE sightings. Some local residents stopped leaving their apartments, he said, and a once-popular restaurant in Lindenwold just closed its doors amid rumors that the couple that owned it has returned to Mexico.
All of this set the stage for last Thursday, when masked federal agents wearing tactical gear arrived early in the morning at Lindenwold’s Woodland Village Apartments just as 44 elementary school kids were waiting for their school bus. The sighting triggered a panic that saw some kids running away and others frantically hustling onto the bus as the driver arrived. No one was apprehended or reported hurt.
On Monday, U.S. Department of Homeland Security officials said the agents went to the complex hoping to arrest a Honduran immigrant who’d once been convicted of aggravated assault. The man was not taken on Thursday and remains free.
Although some outlets reported the large protest was in response to the high-profile raid — which has been covered by the CBS Evening News, MS Now’sMorning Joe, and elsewhere — that took place just a day and a half earlier, the rally actually had been in the works for several weeks.
It had been organized by a young woman from Lindenwold named Tatiana — a 20-year-old business major at Camden County Community College who spoke with me Monday on the condition that I not use her full name — who’d been seeing the ICE activity in her hometown and felt it was time local people spoke out.
Tatiana told me that the idea behind the Lindenwold protest was “to give the community a voice — to be able to say, ‘No, we don’t stand for this.’ That’s the most important thing for me. It’s just bringing community together and deciding we’re not OK with this at all.” But she agreed the bus stop raid had given the event a boost from residents believing “that children should not be scared of federal law enforcement.”
Zobel was one of those neighbors. In the email interview, he described himself as “just your average Joe who grew up in Haddon Heights.” He did volunteer that he’s voted in every election since he turned 18, and that his first ballot was cast for Barack Obama, “and I felt proud walking out of the booth that day.”
Fittingly, Zobel sounded somewhat Obama-esque when he described his dismay over America’s bitter partisan divide. “We as a nation are so angry with one another, and that makes me so sad,” he said. Not surprisingly, he’s as stunned as anyone at the millions of views for Friday’s video, and somewhat concerned about the impact, saying, “I just hope this video does not divide people.”
But Zobel’s words and teary-eyed emotion went viral because it was such a shot of hope — that in a moment when hate is on public display in the streets of the United States, “your average Joe” who’d once stood on the sidelines is now grabbing the American flag and taking the field to fight for their neighbors. An authoritarian movement dependent on rage simply never counted on the brotherly love that sent this nonpolitical Eagles fan to his first protest.
It might not be his last. “I am always happy,” he said, “to help support humanity.”
Yo, do this!
With several inches of snow still on the ground, it might shock you to hear this, but American soccer is back! The Philadelphia Union — despite winning the 2025 Supporters Shield and boasting Major League Soccer’s best winning percentage in the 2020s — radically shook things up during the offseason. With new strikers Ezekiel Alladoh and Agustín Anello looking to amp up their attack, the Union’s quest for the CONCACAF Champions Cup begins Wednesday in Trinidad against Defence Force FC at 6 p.m. on FS2. Saturday night at 7:30 p.m., it’s back to the chillier climes of Washington for the MLS opener against DC United on Apple TV (with no need in 2026 for an additional Season Pass subscription, as in past years).
In the quest for what’s new in American popular culture, sometimes we take for granted the established jewels in our midst. I’ve long felt that MS Now’s 9 p.m. (now just on Monday nights) host Rachel Maddow is our best TV commentator because of the way she weaves the historical past into the headlines of America’s tortured present. But since last summer, she has upped her game. Maddow’s coverage of two stories underreported in most of the mainstream media — grassroots resistance to the Trump regime, and now the push for a nationwide network of warehouse concentration camps — has created appointment television every Monday.
Ask me anything
Question: What is your take on the latest CBS censoring of [Stephen] Colbert? — @bcooper82.bsky.social via Bluesky
Answer: Another Tuesday morning breaking story on deadline: The CBS overseers of Late Night with Stephen Colbert — the top-rated talk show that’s nevertheless ending this year in what critics see as genuflecting to the Trump regime that the program frequently mocks — would not air a recorded interview with Texas state lawmaker and Democratic Senate primary candidate James Talarico. The backstory here is that the Federal Communications Commission has long exempted late-night talk shows from its equal time rule about political candidates on licensed broadcast outlets, but last month, FCC chair Brendan Carr — a pro-Trump MAGA pit bull — said this is changing. That apparently was enough for CBS’s new Trump-friendly management, which would not broadcast the interview (available on YouTube, now certain to get more views than if it hadn’t been censored). This new flap just highlights what a perilous moment this is for the First Amendment and American democracy writ large. Government limits on what viewpoints you can see or hear are a sign of dictatorship, full stop.
What you’re saying about …
Last week’s question about a winning Democratic strategy for the 2026 midterms drew a robust response, and almost all of the replies were thoughtful and nuanced. If there was a consensus, it was that Democrats should tailor their candidates to the divergent views of the congressional districts they hope to win. As Naomi Miller stated, “I think progressive candidates should run in progressive districts, and mainstream democrats in mainstream, purple, and red districts.” Still, a number of you think America’s bad experience with MAGA extremism means a sharp left turn is warranted in response. “I’d like for the Democrats to become more progressive and combative toward Trump than they already are,” wrote Benjamin Spohn, voicing an opinion many share these days.
📮 This week’s question: Tuesday’s passing of the Rev. Jesse Jackson is one more reminder that many icons of America’s tumultuous 20th century are disappearing. So who do you think is the current greatest living American, and why? Please email me your answer and put the exact phrase “greatest living American” in the subject line.
Backstory on the main reason the media is not trusted
Exterior images of CNN headquarters in Atlanta and the New York Times Building in Manhattan.
It’s rare these days to write something that everyone can agree on, but here goes: Public trust in the media has never been lower than it is today. How low? A Gallup poll last fall found that public trust in the ability of newspapers, TV, and radio to fairly and accurately report the news had plunged to 28%, the lowest ever recorded. Why? It’s complicated. The people’s faith in every major institution has declined in the 21st century, after all. And it’s clear that in a deeply divided America, rage against the media machine looks different from the left than it does from the right.
This weekend, in a New York Times piece largely about the broken promises of one media-mogul billionaire — Washington Post owner and Amazon founder Jeff Bezos — columnist Lydia Polgreen put forth an explanation for sinking media trust that jibes with a lot of what I’ve witnessed since graduating into full-time journalism back in 1981. I believe it’s not the only reason — but the biggest, and maybe the most misunderstood.
Polgreen noted that the common theory for the public turning against Big Media — that journalists grew more partisan and biased after the tumult of the 1960s and ‘70s — doesn’t comport with the bigger reality. The era that peaked with the publication of the Pentagon Papers and the Watergate scandal launched a decades-long golden era of profitable news organizations spending big on investigative and accountability journalism — exactly what viewers and readers claimed they wanted.
Yet, trust declined as that happened. Polgreen cited a study in the late 1990s that compared then-contemporary media to 1960s newspapers and found the earlier times were “naïvely trusting of government, shamelessly boosterish, unembarrassedly hokey and obliging.” Polgreen wrote that moving “away from deferential stenography and toward fearless investigation … led to declining trust in the news media. Aggressive, probing and accountability-oriented journalism held up a mirror to American society — and many Americans didn’t like what they saw.”
I think this explanation is spot on, but before readers jump all over me, let me quickly add a couple of caveats. Starting way back in Ronald Reagan’s 1980s, there was also a response to the growing backlash — especially in elite, Beltway journalism — that resulted in too much groveling to authority, and thus stenography around government lies like the 2003 Iraq War. This has only gotten worse with the current wave of billionaire owners like the Post’s Bezos. This means many liberals now also distrust the media, but not for the same reasons as conservatives, who’ve long loathed journalism for probing America’s inequities around race or gender.
The explanation offered by Polgreen jumped out at me because it fit with what I explored in my 2022 book, After the Ivory Tower Falls, which looked at Americans losing trust in another large institution: colleges and universities. The liberal ideas that were nurtured on campuses in the postwar college enrollment boom — including the civil rights movement — triggered the same grievance-filled, largely white working-class backlash as did journalism about social injustice. Today, the only road back for the media is to hold the powerful to account — and understand that not everyone is going to like it.
What I wrote on this date in 2022
People can’t say they didn’t see America’s current crisis coming. On this date four years ago, I expressed my shock and amazement that little more than one year beyond Donald Trump’s attempted coup to stay in power, the right-wing’s creation of a political fantasy world was spiraling out of control, with lies about Hillary Clinton spying on Trump’s 2016 campaign and Joe Biden giving out free crack pipes (?!!). I wrote, “[Historian Ruth] Ben-Ghiat told me that the failure of the Jan. 6 insurrection only forced the GOP to double-down on embracing alternate realities, because ‘they have to reckon with the fact that [Trump] lost, that he’s no longer the leader.’”
There’s been no rest on themass deportation beat. In my Sunday column, I looked at the out-of-control lying from the Trump regime, with unbelievable fictions about everything from shootings and rampant brutality by masked immigration officers to Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick’s whoppers about his friendship with Jeffrey Epstein. I argued that government lying is fundamentally unconstitutional and that the perpetrators need to be punished, including prison time. Over the weekend, I wrote about how, while Minneapolis was a victory for the forces resisting American authoritarianism, that won’t stop Homeland Security from putting thousands of new officers on the street and expanding its concentration camps. The fight for the soul of the nation has only just begun.
What was I saying higher up in this newsletter about accountability journalism? Ever since Lyndon B. Johnson’s Great Society push in the mid-1960s, community nonprofits have been a valuable source of urban renewal, yet aresometimes dragged down by waste, fraud, and abuse. It’s a problem that sadly persists, as shown last week by a major Inquirer investigation into Philadelphia’s NOMO Foundation, one of the best-funded nonprofits attacking youth violence and crime. Ace reporters Ryan W. Briggs and Samantha Melamed found that the foundation has received more than $6 million in public funds in recent years, but faced an IRS lien and eviction lawsuits while it was forced to close its housing program. This is why we have a First Amendment, so that a free press can report on the problems a corrupt or inept government refuses to deal with. Subscribing to The Inquirer gives you access to this type of essential journalism, and you’ll also feel good about supporting this vital work.
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Amid President Donald Trump’s crackdown on immigration and deployment of federal officers to cities across the country, students at Philadelphia-area colleges are protesting against the appearance of U.S. Customs and Border Protection at campus career fairs.
At least four local universities — Thomas Jefferson, Villanova, Temple, and Rowan — have faced opposition to allowing recruitment in recent months.
A petition circulated at Jefferson last week sought to keep CBP from appearing at a campus career event. CBP and ICE — both agencies that enforce immigration laws under the Department of Homeland Security — have been at the center of a national debate after two Minneapolis residents were killed by federal immigration enforcement agents in shootings now under investigation.
“Due to the harm CBP has caused to communities across the nation, it is abhorrent for TJU to accept CBP at their institution,” said anoccupational therapy student who signed the petition and asked that her name be withheld, fearing retribution. “I don’t think any institution should be encouraging students to get involved in these kinds of agencies, given the current climate.”
But the petition has since come down, the student said, and CBP is not on the list of employers due to appear at the event, called the 2026 Career Day and Design Expo, on Thursday at the East Falls campus. Jefferson has not acknowledged that CBP was on the list initially or responded to questions on whether it was removed.
CBP, which has offices in Philadelphia, has appeared at campus career events in the area in the past.
An email seeking comment from CBP’s media office was not returned.
At Rowan University in New Jersey earlier this month, the participation of CBP’s Trade Regulatory Audit Philadelphia Field Office in a career fair drew some student protest. Members of a student activist group distributed fliers speaking out against CBP during the fair, according to Rowan’s student newspaper, the Whit, and campus police and administration officials came to the scene.
The agency also reserved a table and came to afall event at Rowan to share information about accounting-related auditing internships, said Rowan spokesperson Joe Cardona,and has done so at the public university for the last decade.
Rowan’s Rohrer College of Business Center for Professional Development hosts more than 200 employers each year, including local, state, and federal agencies as well as private-sector groups, he said.
“The presence of any employer on campus does not constitute institutional endorsement of that organization’s policies or actions,” Cardona said. “Rather, it reflects our commitment to supporting student career exploration while upholding principles of open access and free expression.”
At Villanova, CBP pulled out of a career fair it had planned to attend earlier this month, according to the Villanovan, the student newspaper. The withdrawal followed criticism on social media about the organization’s planned appearance.
The organizer of an Instagram account that opposed the agency’s participation said they wished that Villanova had made the decision to disallow the group rather than the group withdrawing, according to the student newspaper.
“I think a lot of students will feel a lot safer and more comfortable attending this Career Fair,” the organizer said. “But it doesn’t take away the anger that this was ever something that was gonna happen.”
Villanova said in a statement that CBP‘sOffice of Trade had participated in prior career events and that employers with prior participation were contacted “through standard outreach” about this year’s event.
Temple’s law school last semester had planned to host a “Coffee and Careers” networking event with a DHS and Immigration and Customs Enforcement lawyer but later canceled it, according to the Temple News, the student newspaper. The event was replaced with a talk on public interest law by Philadelphia City Councilmember Rue Landau.
DHS “chose to engage directly with students interested in DHS opportunities rather than participate in a scheduled career event,” Temple spokesperson Steve Orbanek said.
He also noted that “career fairs are university-sponsored events, and actions that disrupt these events may violate university policy and established on-campus demonstration guidelines.”
The Lindenwold School District reported Thursday that fourth- and fifth-grade students waiting at a bus stop ran away in a panic when a U.S. Customs and Immigration Enforcement operation occurred nearby.
The incident happened in the morning as the students were waiting to take a bus to school from the Woodland Village Apartments, the district said in a statement.
Superintendent Kristin O’Neil said about 44 students were waiting at the bus when unmarked vehicles arrived at the complex. Officers in tactical gear and wearing masks fanned out, she said.
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“The presence of multiple enforcement vehicles caused significant fear and confusion, and several students ran from the bus stop. Our bus driver acted quickly and responsibly, circling back multiple times to ensure as many children as possible were safely transported to school,” the district said, also thanking the bus driver.
A Ring video from the apartment complex provided to some news outlets shows the children running with some shouting: “ICE! ICE!”
“Upon arrival to school, many children were understandably upset and emotional,” the district said.
“All students currently in school are safe,” the district said. “ICE Agents are NOT at the Lindenwold School District.”
O’Neil said the students attend the district’s school No. 5. About 20 students didn’t show up Thursday, she said. The district will work with families of students who will be marked absent, she said.
“To us, these are our children,” O’Neil said.
About 60% of the district’s 3,100 students are Hispanic, according to its latest school performance report. O’Neil said it is not unusual for parents to keep their children home when there are reports of ICE activity in the area.
A district leader reached out to county and state representatives to alert them about the incident and to advocate for protocols that prioritize the safety of children during any future ICE operations, the district said.
“Our students deserve to feel safe while waiting for their school bus and while attending school each day,” the district said.
A spokesperson for ICE could not be reached for comment Thursday night.
U.S. Rep. Donald Norcross, (D., NJ), who represents the district, was among several dozen people who showed up Friday at an “ICE Out of Lindenwold” protest at Lindenwold Borough Hall. The protest was announced before the bus stop incident.
“Schoolchildren are not criminals, and enforcement actions must reflect that,” Norcross said in a statement. “… Our community will not be terrorized, and we will keep fighting to protect our neighborhoods.”
Lindenwold, located about 16 miles southeast of Philadelphia, has been among several communities in Camden County that have been subject to ICE operations.
County Commissioner Director Louis Cappelli Jr. said in a statement Thursday night that “the absolute chaos sowed by this ICE operation in Lindenwold this morning was appalling.”
Cappelli added that “we are short on facts and details about the intentions of ICE,” however at some point ICE called 911 to request local police assistance.
“That said, the impact and fear that struck the children of our county was painful to watch, and I can’t imagine the anxiety and trauma that came from this incident,” Cappelli said.
He added, “As a community, segments of our population are being terrorized and scared to leave their homes. This is no way for any of us to live.”
County Commissioner Jonathan Young said in a statement: “As a former Lindenwold resident, I’m disgusted to watch the videos of children running in absolute terror along a busy county thoroughfare.”
Young said that “no one wants criminals in their community,” but added that, “under Trump, ICE has been inhumane in how it conducts its operations. We’ve seen that firsthand throughout other cities in the country, and now it’s happening here.”
Gov. Josh Shapiro implored Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem this week to reconsider converting warehouses in Berks and Schuylkill counties into mass immigration detention centers, citing “real harms” to the communities.
In a Thursday letter to Noem obtained by The Inquirer, Shapiro questioned the legality of the facilities, which the governor said could hold up to 9,000 people in total.
Hinting at a possible lawsuit, Shapiro said if DHS goes through with converting the sites, his administration will “aggressively pursue every option to prevent these facilities from opening and needlessly harming the good people of Pennsylvania.”
As part of President Donald Trump’s expanding deportation agenda, the federal government has started purchasing warehouses across the country to flip into U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention centers. ICE is planning to spend $38.3 billion turning warehouses into detention centers, The Washington Post reported.
Shapiro slammed the department’s escalating immigration enforcement strategy, saying that ICE and other federal immigration agents “resort to unnecessary and excessive force, leading to innocent people being injured or tragically killed.”
“Your Department’s record is reason enough to oppose your plan to use warehouses in Schuylkill and Berks Counties as detention centers,” Shapiro wrote, adding that the warehouses would also negatively impact residents’ health and safety, deplete tax revenue, and put extra stress on local communities and emergency response.
Tricia McLaughlin, DHS assistant secretary for public affairs, confirmed ICE’s purchase of these two warehouses and the department’s plans to use them as detention facilities in a statement to The Inquirer Friday.
She said that the sites will “undergo community impact studies and a rigorous due diligence process to make sure there is no hardship on local utilities or infrastructure prior to purchase” and that the facilities would create economic benefits, including bringing more than 11,000 jobs to the two Pennsylvania communities in total.
“Thanks to the One Big Beautiful Bill, ICE has new funding to expand detention space to keep these criminals off American streets before they are removed for good from our communities,” McLaughlin said.
He’s said the Trump administration’s strategies in American cities make communities less safe, violate constitutional rights, and erode trust in law enforcement.
In his letter to Noem, Shapiro said that DHS has not engaged local leaders to discuss the warehouse purchases and that both Democratic and Republican state and local officials have objected to the department’s “plans to interfere with our communities because of the chaos and harm your actions will bring.”
Some of Shapiro’s cabinet secretaries also penned an additional letter to Noem where they stressed that the facilities would be detrimental to the communities’ environment and public health and safety.
“The stress each facility will place on local infrastructure will, among other things, jeopardize Pennsylvanians’ access to safe water, deplete resources and infrastructure needed for emergencies, and overextend already strained emergency response personnel,” wrote Pennsylvania Health Secretary Debra L. Bogen, Fire Commissioner Thomas Cook, Emergency Management Director Randy Padfield, Environmental Protection Secretary Jessica Shirley, and Labor Secretary Nancy A. Walker.
In addition to the warehouses, DHS is also leasing new office space throughout the country, including in the Philadelphia area. The department said back-office staff, including lawyers and analysts, will be moving into a building in Berwyn, and the department will also share space with the Department of Motor Vehicles at Eighth and Arch Streets in Center City, WIRED reported.
Despite the governor’s vocal opposition to Trump’s enforcementstrategies, Pennsylvania still cooperates with ICE. Shapiro’s administration honors some ICE detainers in state prisons and provides ICE with access to state databases that include personal identifying information for immigrants.
Immigrant rights groups have for months called on Shapiro to take more decisive action against federal immigration enforcement in Pennsylvania and end all cooperation with the agency.
WASHINGTON — A shutdown for the Department of Homeland Security appeared certain Thursday as lawmakers in the House and Senate were set to leave Washington for a 10-day break and negotiations with the White House over Democrats’ demands for new restrictions had stalled.
Democrats and the White House have traded offers in recent days as the Democrats have said they want curbs on President Donald Trump’s broad campaign of immigration enforcement. They have demanded better identification for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and other federal law enforcement officers, a new code of conduct for those agencies and more use of judicial warrants, among other requests.
The White House sent its latest proposal late Wednesday, but Trump told reporters on Thursday that some of the Democratic demands would be “very, very hard to approve.”
Democrats said the White House offer, which was not made public, did not include sufficient curbs on ICE after two protesters were fatally shot last month. The offer was “not serious,” Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer of New York said Thursday, after the Senate rejected a bill to fund the department.
Americans want accountability and “an end to the chaos,” Schumer said. “The White House and congressional Republicans must listen and deliver.”
Lawmakers in both chambers were on notice to return to Washington if the two sides struck a deal to end the expected shutdown. Sen. Patty Murray, the top Democrat on the Senate Appropriations Committee, told reporters that Democrats would send the White House a counterproposal over the weekend.
Impact of a shutdown
Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., said after the vote that a shutdown appeared likely and “the people who are not going to be getting paychecks” will pay the price.
The impact of a DHS shutdown is likely to be minimal at first. It would not likely block any of the immigration enforcement operations, as Trump’s tax and spending cut bill passed last year gave ICE about $75 billion to expand detention capacity and bolster enforcement operations.
But the other agencies in the department — including the Transportation Security Administration, the Federal Emergency Management Agency, the Secret Service and the Coast Guard — could take a bigger hit over time.
Gregg Phillips, an associate administrator at FEMA, said at a hearing this week that its disaster relief fund has sufficient balances to continue emergency response activities during a shutdown, but would become seriously strained in the event of a catastrophic disaster.
Phillips said that while the agency continues to respond to threats like flooding and winter storms, long-term planning and coordination with state and local partners will be “irrevocably impacted.”
Trump defends officer masking
Trump, who has remained largely silent during the bipartisan talks, noted Thursday that a recent court ruling rejected a ban on masks for federal law enforcement officers.
“We have to protect our law enforcement,” Trump told reporters.
Democrats made the demands for new restrictions on ICE and other federal law enforcement after ICU nurse Alex Pretti was shot and killed by a U.S. Border Patrol officer in Minneapolis on Jan. 24. Renee Good was shot by ICE agents on Jan. 7.
Trump agreed to a Democratic request that the Homeland Security bill be separated from a larger spending measure that became law last week. That package extended Homeland Security funding at current levels only through Friday.
Schumer and House Democratic leader Hakeem Jeffries of New York have said they want immigration officers to remove their masks, to show identification and to better coordinate with local authorities. They have also demanded a stricter use-of-force policy for the federal officers, legal safeguards at detention centers and a prohibition on tracking protesters with body-worn cameras.
Democrats also say Congress should end indiscriminate arrests and require that before a person can be detained, authorities have verified that the person is not a U.S. citizen.
Thune suggested there were potential areas of compromise, including on masks. There could be contingencies “that these folks aren’t being doxed,” Thune said. “I think they could find a landing place.”
But Republicans have been largely opposed to most of the items on the Democrats’ list, including a prohibition on masks.
Sen. Eric Schmitt, R-Mo., said Republicans who have pushed for stronger immigration enforcement would benefit politically from the Democratic demands.
“So if they want to have that debate, we’ll have that debate all they want,” said Schmitt.
Judicial warrants a sticking point
Thune, who has urged Democrats and the White House to work together, indicated that another sticking point is judicial warrants.
“The issue of warrants is going to be very hard for the White House or for Republicans,” Thune said of the White House’s most recent offer. “But I think there are a lot of other areas where there has been give, and progress.”
Schumer and Jeffries have said DHS officers should not be able to enter private property without a judicial warrant and that warrant procedures and standards should be improved. They have said they want an end to “roving patrols” of agents who are targeting people in the streets and in their homes.
Most immigration arrests are carried out under administrative warrants. Those are internal documents issued by immigration authorities that authorize the arrest of a specific person but do not permit officers to forcibly enter private homes or other nonpublic spaces without consent. Traditionally, only warrants signed by judges carry that authority.
But an internal ICE memo obtained by The Associated Press last month authorizes ICE officers to use force to enter a residence based solely on a more narrow administrative warrant to arrest someone with a final order of removal, a move that advocates say collides with Fourth Amendment protections.
Far from agreement
Thune, R-S.D., said were “concessions” in the White House offer. He would not say what those concessions were, though, and he acknowledged the sides were “a long ways toward a solution.”
Schumer said it was not enough that the administration had announced an end to the immigration crackdown in Minnesota that led to thousands of arrests and the fatal shootings of two protesters.
“We need legislation to rein in ICE and end the violence,” Schumer said, or the actions of the administration “could be reversed tomorrow on a whim.”
Simmering partisan tensions played out on the Senate floor immediately after the vote, as Alabama Sen. Katie Britt, the chairwoman of the Senate Appropriations subcommittee that oversees Homeland Security funding, tried to pass a two-week extension of Homeland Security funding and Democrats objected.
Britt said Democrats were “posturing” and that federal employees would suffer for it. “I’m over it!” she yelled.
Connecticut Sen. Chris Murphy, the top Democrat on the Homeland spending subcommittee, responded that Democrats “want to fund the Department of Homeland Security, but only a department that is obeying the law.”
“This is an exceptional moment in this country’s history,” Murphy said.
