Federal officials in public statements have improperly compared Rep. LaMonica McIver to antifa, McIver’s attorneys say in a new court filing. (Fran Baltzer for New Jersey Monitor)
Lawyers for an indicted New Jersey congresswoman sent a letter to the judge overseeing her case on Monday objecting to federal officials comparing her to antifa in public statements.
The letter is the third time that lawyers for Rep. LaMonica McIver (D-10), who is accused of assaulting federal officers during a scuffle outside a migrant jail in Newark in May, have criticized government officials’ public statements about the congresswoman. McIver’s attorneys have said they threaten McIver’s right to a fair trial by an impartial jury.
“We bring these statements to the Court’s attention as fresh evidence of the need to restrain the government’s extrajudicial statements related to this case … as well as of the government’s unconstitutional selective enforcement and prosecution,” Monday’s letter from McIver attorney Paul Fishman reads.
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Fishman’s letter refers to a Sept. 26 U.S. Department of Homeland Security press release headlined “DHS is Fighting Back Against Antifa Violence” that includes McIver in a list of “Antifa-aligned left-wing violent extremists” facing federal charges.
McIver was indicted over claims that she impeded Newark Mayor Ras Baraka’s May 9 arrest at Delaney Hall, the migrant jail in Newark. Federal prosecutors say McIver assaulted officers during the melee that erupted when agents moved to arrest Baraka (prosecutors dropped the single charge facing Baraka days after his arrest).
Other suspects included in the Sept. 26 press release include a 36-year-old who allegedly entered a Dallas migrant jail and claimed he had a bomb, someone accused of shooting at ICE officers at a facility in Texas and a Tennessee woman accused of attempting to run over a U.S. Customs and Border Patrol agent with her car.
In Monday’s letter, Fishman also referenced a social media post from the Department of Homeland Security on Sept. 26 that included McIver in a thread touting arrests of “dozens of Antifa-aligned left-wing violent extremists.”
The thread is still online, but the specific post citing McIver as an example for “assaulting a federal law enforcement officer” and accusing several members of Congress of “breaking into” Delaney Hall has been deleted.
In legal filings in McIver’s case from August and September, her legal team objected to separate posts from federal officials that they said prevented McIver from getting a fair trial. Some of those posts, including one that claimed she and her House colleagues “stormed the gate and broke into” Delaney Hall, have been deleted.
Videos released by court officials last week captured more than two hours of footage from May 9, including video showing McIver and two of her House colleagues, Reps. Rob Menendez and Bonnie Watson Coleman, walking onto the jail’s property and then being escorted inside the facility.
McIver has pleaded not guilty to the charges. She said she was at the jail on May 9 to conduct a legal but unannounced inspection of Delaney Hall, which had opened days earlier despite Newark city officials’ claim that it had not been properly inspected by the city. She says federal prosecutors are improperly targeting her because she’s a Democrat who has been critical of President Donald Trump’s immigration agenda.
A spokesperson for the Department of Homeland Security deferred to the Department of Justice, which did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
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