Brad Lander, the New York City comptroller who is running for mayor, was arrested on Tuesday by federal agents at an immigration courthouse in Lower Manhattan as he tried to escort a migrant out of the building to prevent his arrest.
Mr. Lander, a Democrat, was observing proceedings at the city’s main immigration courthouse, at 26 Federal Plaza, where an increasing number of migrants who appear for court have been arrested in recent weeks by Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents.
Videos taken by reporters at the courthouse show Mr. Lander standing by a migrant man in a crowded hallway when several men who appear to be law enforcement officers, some wearing masks, walk up to the pair in an apparent attempt to arrest the migrant.
Mr. Lander repeatedly asks the agents whether they have a judicial warrant and walks behind them, according to one of the videos, which was posted on social media by a reporter from The City, a digital news outlet.
Mr. Lander appears to hold onto the man as the agents shepherd him toward the elevators. “I will let go when you show me the judicial warrant,” he says, his right hand on the man’s shoulder.
Agents can be seen trying to pry Mr. Lander away. They ultimately separate Mr. Lander from the man, push him against a wall by the elevators and place handcuffs on him.
“You don’t have the authority to arrest U.S. citizens,” Mr. Lander says repeatedly, according to the video. “I’m not obstructing. I’m standing right here in the hallway. I asked to see the judicial warrant.” (Agents do not need judicial warrants to make arrests in immigration courts because they are public spaces, immigration lawyers said.)
Dora Pekec, a spokeswoman for Mr. Lander, said that he “was taken by masked agents and detained by ICE.”
“This is still developing and we are monitoring the situation closely,” she added.
Chloe Chik, a spokeswoman for the comptroller’s office, said Mr. Lander was being held on the 10th floor of 26 Federal Plaza, where migrants apprehended by ICE are typically detained.
In a statement, Tricia McLaughlin, a spokeswoman for the Department of Homeland Security, the parent agency of ICE, said that Mr. Lander “was arrested for assaulting law enforcement and impeding a federal officer.”
“Our heroic ICE law enforcement officers face a 413 percent increase in assaults against them,” she added. “It is wrong that politicians seeking higher office undermine law enforcement safety to get a viral moment. No one is above the law, and if you lay a hand on a law enforcement officer, you will face consequences.”
A spokesman for the U.S. attorney’s office in Manhattan declined to comment on whether it would seek charges against Mr. Lander.
The arrest came a week before the Democratic primary for mayor. Mr. Lander is running in a crowded field, and has been racing to make inroads against former Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo, the front-runner who has led nearly all polls. Zohran Mamdani, a state assemblyman who is running second behind Mr. Cuomo, and Mr. Lander have cross-endorsed each other.
Mr. Lander, who is part of his party’s left flank, has spent a good portion of his campaign arguing that he is the candidate best positioned to stand up to President Trump’s attempts to cut funding and deport immigrants from New York City.
He has spoken repeatedly about protecting the city’s sanctuary laws, which limit cooperation between city agencies and the federal government on immigration enforcement. And he has called for an increase in city funding to provide legal representation to immigrants facing deportation who do not have lawyers.
Tuesday marked the third time that Mr. Lander had appeared at the city’s immigration courts, where ICE agents, typically wearing masks, have become a regular presence as the agency ramps up arrests of migrants showing up for routine court hearings.
Prosecutors with the Department of Homeland Security have surprised a number of migrants by dismissing their cases when they appear in court, a legal tactic that opens the door for ICE agents to arrest them in the hallways once they leave and place them in expedited deportation proceedings without hearings.
Several Democratic politicians, including members of Congress, have shown up at immigration courthouses in recent weeks to protest the Trump administration’s new tactics.
During his previous appearances, Mr. Lander sat quietly during hearings and then escorted a few families that seemed at risk of arrest out of the courthouse and to a nearby subway station. His arrest on Tuesday marked his first altercation with federal agents patrolling the courthouse hallways, lobbies and elevators.
His campaign appeared to quickly move to capitalize on his arrest, with his wife, Meg Barnette, posting a video of the episode from Mr. Lander’s official campaign account on social media.
Mr. Cuomo also condemned the arrest.
“This is the latest example of the extreme thuggery of Trump’s ICE out of control — one can only imagine the fear families across our country feel when confronted with ICE,” he wrote in a post on social media.
Jeffery C. Mays and Jonah E. Bromwich contributed reporting.
Luis Ferré-Sadurní is a Times reporter covering immigration, focused on the influx of migrants arriving in the New York region.
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