When We Say New York for All, We Mean Everyone

Mr. A came to the U.S. from Trinidad and Tobago at just five years old. After graduating from high school, he sought to save up money to continue his education and was asked by a friend to help sell drugs. He was arrested and convicted of selling less than a half-gram of cocaine for $50 and received a sentence of five years probation. During this time, he obtained an Associate’s degree, reflected on his actions, and began to move on with life – until ICE cruelly detained him at his probation appointment and deported him, tearing him away from his mother who depended on his care and support. 

How did this happen? The county probation department had shared his personal information with ICE, without accounting for the harm he would face, despite the fact that he had completed his sentence and was starting anew. 

Today tens of thousands of New Yorkers are living with a daily fear they may be taken off the street, detained and deported by ICE. Those of our family members, friends and neighbors like Mr. A, who have prior convictions, face the biggest risk. 

That’s why advocates and community members are urging the introduction of the New York for All Act in Albany, a bill that would substantially disentangle local and state agencies– including local and state law enforcement– from ICE and mass deportations. 

In our decades of experience, we have seen how the racial bias within every stage of the criminal legal and immigration systems leads to targeting of Black, Latinx and other communities of color, who are questioned, stopped, arrested, convicted and deported at higher rates than white New Yorkers. Racial profiling and discrimination are baked into the system, leading to these clear disparities. 

The intent of New York for All is to make our state a safer and more just place for all.

When a community member has been ordered released by a judge, had their charges dropped, or completed a sentence, they should be able to go home and reunite with their loved ones. 

If we don’t pass New York for All now, ICE will continue to rip people from their families without a judicial warrant and funnel them into detention and deportation. This undermines the most basic principles of due process. It’s a cruel double punishment based solely on where someone was born.

Governor Hochul herself knows what’s at stake for immigrants who have contact with the criminal legal system. She pardoned Sammy Vatthanavong last year, who immigrated as a child but faced deportation due to an old criminal conviction, saying, “They’ve paid their debt, and I’ll be damned if I let them be deported to a country where they don’t know a soul. And to those who would demonize them to score political points, I ask: Where is your compassion?”

We cannot allow local law enforcement to double down on double punishment or reinforce racial bias. We should also expand accountability when officers violate people’s rights, through bills like End Qualified Immunity, rather than exclude people from protections.

Detention and deportation are violent acts. New Yorkers can be abducted to detention centers and expelled to third countries where their lives are at risk. 

Thirty-two people died in ICE detention in 2025 and we have already lost at least 13 people this year. There are reports across the country of sexual abuse, beatings, and medical neglect in ICE detention facilities. ICE is using our state and local tax dollars to detain people being sent into a “black box” where they may never be heard from again. ICE has defied court orders that prohibited banishing people to the infamous CECOT prison in El Salvador, where numerous organizations have documented that torture is occurring, and stranded people in other countries, where they may disappear.

The legislature and the governor have the chance now to pass New York for All to protect the rights of all the people who reside in the state. Like Governor Hochul said herself, It’s time for our leaders in Albany to stand up to the politicians who demonize our immigrant family members and neighbors to score political points. Show your compassion, be just and take action to make New York a safe home for us all. 

Karla McKanders is the Director of the Thurgood Marshall Institute at LDF (Legal Defense Fund). Yasmine Farhang is the Executive Director of the Immigrant Defense Project.