NEW YORK — Gov. Kathy Hochul on Tuesday endorsed legislation that would allow New York residents to sue Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents in state court for civil rights violations, an escalation of efforts by Democratic-led states to rein in the agency following a woman’s fatal shooting in Minneapolis last week.
During her annual State of the State address in Albany, Hochul (D) said “protecting New Yorkers” was her top priority and that now includes “standing up to ICE agents who abuse their power.”
“Power does not justify abuse,” Hochul said. “And if someone’s constitutional rights are violated here in the state of New York, I say they deserve their day in court.”
Hochul’s support for related proposals in the legislature comes as Democratic governors and lawmakers from around the country are seeking ways to try to blunt what they consider overly aggressive federal immigration tactics under President Donald Trump.
The work underway in states such as Illinois, Maryland and New Jersey includes efforts to ban ICE officers from wearing masks and bills that would bar them from later securing employment in state or local police departments.
If approved, Hochul’s push to open up ICE agents to civil liability would almost certainly be challenged by the Trump administration.
Tricia McLaughlin, a spokesperson for the Department of Homeland Security, said Hochul was trying to “smear law enforcement who are simply enforcing the rule of law and putting their lives on the line to remove violent criminals from New York.”
“DHS law enforcement officers follow the law and the U.S. Constitution,” McLaughlin continued, saying federal agents were being attacked, harassed and threatened as they try to carry out their duties.
But the governor’s position underscores how Democratic politicians are becoming increasingly emboldened to take on ICE, especially after an ICE officer killed Renée Good, a mother of three, during a still-expanding operation in Minneapolis.
“When boundaries are crossed, accountability matters,” Hochul said. “No one from the president on down is above the law.”
New York Assembly member Micah Lasher (D), who introduced legislation similar to Hochul’s proposal last year, said the legislation would bring New York in line with policies already in effect in several states, including California, Massachusetts and Maine.
Lasher said the concept is based on a theory known as “converse 1983.” It maintains that federal officials should be liable in state courts should they violate federal civil rights laws, just as Section 1983 of the federal code made state and local officials liable in federal court should they violate those statues. The section was enacted in 1871 in part to give Black Americans additional protections against the Ku Klux Klan.
“I think it’s important both as a concrete matter and as a matter of moral clarity for state governments to do everything they can to push back and protect people from egregious overreaches of ICE under the Trump administration,” said Lasher, who represents Manhattan’s Upper West Side neighborhood. “And by creating increased legal exposure for individual ICE agents, it is the hope that this legislation will be at least something of a deterrent.”
Perry Grossman, a supervising attorney for the New York Civil Liberties Union, said the changes are needed because the U.S. Supreme Court has made it exceptionally difficult for citizens to hold federal agents accountable under federal law. The court has carved out broad qualified immunity protections for government officials, he noted, though they are still bound by the U.S. Constitution.
“All this is really doing is giving New Yorkers an opportunity to sue for violations of their constitutional rights,” Grossman said. “The state is not regulating federal officers. The United States Constitution is regulating federal officers, and the state is simply saying, ‘Here you can use our court to vindicate those federal constitutional rights.’”
Lasher conceded that the premise of state lawsuits against federal officials, carrying out federal laws, remains untested. He said he is unaware of anyone who has brought a state civil suit against an ICE agent in any of the states with a law already in effect.
“I believe the private right-of-action itself would be pretty hard to challenge,” he said. “But you are going to see cases where federal agents try to move their case to federal courts.”
Hochul on Tuesday also announced plans to strengthen the state’s sanctuary policies by banning ICE from conducting enforcement raids in “sensitive locations” without a judge’s sign-off.
“We will not allow masked ICE agents to storm our schools, our day care centers, our hospitals, our houses of worship for civil immigration raids unless they have a judicial warrant,” she declared.
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