Local and state officials in New York are expressing outrage after dozens of federal agents carried out a US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) raid in Manhattan’s Chinatown on Tuesday.
Eyewitnesses accounts and video footage captured the chaotic scenes in Lower Manhattan on Tuesday afternoon, where masked and armed federal agents were seen detaining several individuals near Canal Street, while crowds of New Yorkers gathered, protesting against the action. Military-style vehicles were also seen driving through the area.
The Department of Homeland Security described the operation as a “targeted, intelligence-driven enforcement operation on Canal Street in New York City, focused on criminal activity relating to selling counterfeit goods”.
The raid drew swift condemnation from local and state leaders.
The New York police department (NYPD) quickly distanced itself from the operation, stating that the department had “no involvement in the federal operation that took place on Canal Street this afternoon”.
Eric Adams, the mayor, reposted the NYPD’s statement and added: “New York City does not cooperate with federal law enforcement on civil deportations, in accordance with our local laws.”
The New York governor, Kathy Hochul, condemned the operation and hit out at Donald Trump.
Trump, she said, “claims he’s targeting the ‘worst of the worst’” but “today his agents used batons and pepper spray on street vendors and bystanders on Canal Street”.
“You don’t make New York safer by attacking New Yorkers,” she said.
Chuck Schumer, a New York senator, called the raid “indiscriminate, wrong, and destructive” and said that federal immigration agencies “should target criminals for arrest and deportation – not unleash reckless raids against vendors on the streets of the city”.
“This creates fear and chaos and does not make us safer,” he added.
Jumaane Williams, the city’s public advocate, said that federal agents deprived “vendors of due process and ripping them from their families – all because they tried to earn a living”. The city comptroller, Brad Lander, said that “street vendors are not a national security threat” and thanked the “New Yorkers who mobilized quickly”.
Murad Awawdeh, president and CEO of the New York Immigration Coalition, described the raid on Tuesday as a “horrifying display of federal overreach and authoritarian tactics”, adding that “our communities deserve safety, dignity and due process – not fear and violence that tear families apart”.
He also told reporters that a few people were taken into custody for protesting and blocking Ice’s efforts.
A DHS spokesperson told CBS News that people in the crowd “were shouting obscenities, became violent and obstructed law enforcement duties” and said that at least one protester was arrested for allegedly assaulting a federal officer.
The three candidates for New York City mayor also reacted to the raid.
The Democratic candidate, Zohran Mamdani, condemned the operation as a “aggressive and reckless raid on immigrant street vendors”, adding: “Once again, the Trump administration chooses authoritarian theatrics that create fear, not safety. It must stop.”
Andrew Cuomo, the independent candidate and former New York governor, called the raid an “abuse of federal power by the Trump administration: more about fear than justice, more about politics than safety.
“This is not who we are, and it will never be NYC when I am mayor,” Cuomo said. “The Statue of Liberty stands in our harbor, not as a decoration, but as a declaration of our values and the promise of America.”
And in a statement to the Gothamist, a spokesperson for the Republican candidate, Curtis Sliwa, said that the federal government should prioritize the deportation of “gang members, sex traffickers, and those involved in major crimes.
“[Sliwa] has also been clear that the backs of restaurants and other service industries should not be the focus of immigration enforcement, and that resources should target dangerous offenders, not working people,” the spokesperson added.
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