Body cam video shows arrest of Newark Mayor Ras Baraka at ICE facility
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Delaney Hall, NJ - The Department of Homeland Security released body cam video Saturday showing the moments federal officers arrested the mayor of Newark, New Jersey, at an Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility.
DHS blurred the faces of those seen on camera.
Newark Mayor Ras Baraka was taken into custody for allegedly entering and staying on Delaney Hall property unlawfully Friday. He was held for hours before being released and charged with trespassing.
In a press release, the DHS accused Congressmembers Bonnie Watson Coleman and Robert Menendez Jr. of storming the gate and breaking into the facility illegally.
Tricia McLaughlin, the assistant secretary of public affairs for DHS, told CNN an investigation is underway and more arrests could be on the horizon.
"We actually have body camera footage of some of these members of Congress assaulting our ICE enforcement officers, including body-slamming a female ICE officer, so we will be showing that to viewers very shortly," McLaughlin said.
"The notion that I or any of my colleagues 'body slammed' armed federal officers is absurd," Watson Coleman wrote in a post on X.
"Nobody from ICE was slammed on the ground. We didn't storm the place. So it's, all of it is a lie," Baraka said.
The mayor pushed back, saying he was invited to the ICE facility and stayed for over an hour.
"Somebody allowed me to go in. I didn't climb a fence. I didn't kick the door down," Baraka said.
He claims no one said a word to him while he was on the property, but Alina Habba, the interim U.S. Attorney for the District of New Jersey, posted on X that the mayor ignored multiple warning to remove himself.
Baraka described his arrest as humiliating, stressful and depressing.
"They made a decision to arrest me. They made a decision to violate me. They made a decision to humiliate me, to put me in cuffs and told the people to take me to the ground. Thank God the Office of Homeland Security didn't do that," he said.
The mayor said he was treated with dignity and respect while in custody, and he fully cooperated.