NJ cities win sanctuary city lawsuit

Good morning!

A federal judge in Newark handed a big loss to the Trump administration Wednesday by ruling that the federal government cannot sue four New Jersey cities over their policies limiting local law enforcements’ role in immigration enforcement.

The cities — Newark, Jersey City, Paterson, and Hoboken — each have a sanctuary policy that dates to the first Trump administration, which sued over them last year when it was starting to ramp up its mass deportation effort.

But the judge, Evelyn Padin, a Biden appointee, says the federal government has no standing to sue here. Padin notes that, even if she were to rule in the federal government’s favor, the state has its own sanctuary policy that also bars the cities’ cops from aiding federal immigration efforts in most cases. If the cities’ policies are tossed by the court, she said, nothing changes.

“The Federal Government’s case has a fundamental flaw — it treats the Challenged Policies as though they operate in isolation. They do not,” Padin wrote in her 38-page decision.

Padin also noted that the state’s policy — the Immigrant Trust Directive, a version of which was signed into law earlier this year by Gov. Mikie Sherrill — has been upheld by a federal appeals court, meaning Padin has no power to strike it down as unconstitutional.

Assemblyman Ravi Bhalla (D-Hudson), who signed Hoboken’s policy when he was mayor of that city, cheered.

“The court got it right here, and they saw right through the Trump administration’s attempt to politicize the Justice Department. Cities and states have every right to decide how their own resources are used, and that includes making sure our tax dollars aren’t spent separating families and deporting our neighbors. This is a huge win for the people of New Jersey,” he said.

Read more from Nikita Biryukov.

Courts: Lawyers for Rep. LaMonica McIver and for the Trump administration faced off in Delaware Wednesday as the two sides argued over whether the U.S. 3rd Circuit Court of Appeals should toss McIver’s federal assault charges. McIver is accused of assaulting federal agents during a fracas at Newark migrant jail Delaney Hall last year. She contends she was at the jail to conduct congressional oversight duties and so cannot be prosecuted for her actions there. Prosecutors say she can’t be prosecuted for taking a tour of the jail, but she can for shoving two agents during the melee that erupted when agents arrested Newark Mayor Ras Baraka. After the hearing, McIver, who is pregnant with her second child, told reporters the whole thing has her exhausted. “I have, literally, the president of the United States and the Department of Justice trying to send me to jail for 17 years. That’s very frightening,” she said.

More: Our state’s Supreme Court ruled yesterday that prosecutors must hand over facial recognition information to lawyers for a murder suspect in Hudson County. The defendant in this case sought 13 pieces of information related to the facial recognition software that police used to identify him, prosecutors provided “limited” items in discovery and then appealed the trial judge’s order that it provide more. The high court ruled unanimously that the state has to provide everything the defendant asked for, except for proprietary information related to the software.

World Cup: Katie Sobko and Colleen Wilson at the Bergen Record look at all the ties between former Gov. Phil Murphy and the committee that is organizing New Jersey’s World Cup games, a committee led by Phil’s wife, Tammy, that also includes a bunch of Murphy loyalists who get to decide how to spend the millions in taxpayer dollars we’ve given them.

Tom Kean Jr.: I must say, I was very skeptical last week when the New Jersey Globe reported that Rep. Tom Kean Jr.’s staff said he would be back at work in two weeks. After all, that’s the same thing they’ve been saying about every two weeks since Kean disappeared from public view back in March. But Tracey Tully at the New York Times reports that Kean, wearing a suit and tie, answered the door of his Westfield home Tuesday and said he’d chat with her next week. A Kean spokesman said Kean will explain his extended absence on Tuesday.

D.C.: Busy day in our nation’s capital Wednesday! Trump stood up a planned bill signing moments before it was supposed to take place, leading to some “Veep”-level style absurdity when the event went on without him even though he wasn’t there to sign the bipartisan housing bill they were all there to watch be signed. Also yesterday, the nation’s postmaster general told senators that the U.S. Postal Service plans not to deliver mail ballots in states that have not handed over private voter roll information to the White House (New Jersey is one of them). Meanwhile, Louisiana Sen. Bill Cassidy (R) joined one of our own senators, Cory Booker (D), in a letter to the attorney general that expresses “serious concerns” about a deal Trump made with the IRS that bars the agency from ever investigating Trump, his family, or their businesses.