When former City Council Speaker Melissa Mark-Viverito helped pass the City's slate of new "sanctuary" laws in 2017, she believed the laws themselves, and the guidance that went along with them, were clear: City workers would not allow in federal immigration enforcement into City buildings without a signed warrant.
But new guidance issued by City Hall in January, whose existence was first reported on by Hell Gate last week, inserted a massive loophole to the law. Now, if City workers felt they were uncomfortable or threatened in any way, they themselves could make the decision to allow ICE into the building.
"The mayor didn't go public with this because he knows it's in defiance of the existing law. To have a mayor do that, is really scary," Mark-Viverito told Hell Gate on Sunday. The former councilmember who represented Harlem and the South Bronx was standing on the steps of Tweed Courthouse, where dozens of local elected officials, healthcare workers, and immigrant rights groups were rallying to call on the mayor to rescind the memo. "There are laws in place that are really clear, and on his own, he's trying to undermine it unilaterally?"