Brad Lander, comptroller and mayoral candidate, detained by ICE

City Comptroller Brad Lander was arrested by federal law enforcement at Federal Plaza in Manhattan on Tuesday.  AP Photo/Olga Fedorova

By Ryan Schwach

New York City Comptroller and candidate for mayor Brad Lander was arrested and detained by federal immigration officials in Manhattan on Tuesday. He was later released with no charges.

Lander was at Federal Plaza on Tuesday accompanying defendants who had just gotten out of immigration hearings when he was detained by ICE while asking officers for a judicial warrant for the arrest of the defendant he was escorting.

He spent about three hours in custody before being released and had the charges brought against him dropped.

In a video recorded inside the immigration court on Tuesday afternoon, Lander is seen being held by officers saying; “I will let go when you show me the judicial warrant.”

“You don’t have the authority to arrest U.S Citizens, I’m not obstructing, I am standing here in the hallway. I am asking to see the judicial warrant,” he says as he is being handcuffed and taken into an elevator.

Speaking outside the federal building after being released, Lander said he was there volunteering with a group called Immigrant Arc, and was asked to escort a man who had just had his status revoked, Edgardo, out of the building.

“All I tried to do was just hold Edgardo's arm and ask the ICE agents, ‘do you have a warrant?’ and they would not show me the warrant,” Lander said. “I said I'd let go of his arm as soon as they showed it to me, and they did not show it to me, and you saw what happened.”

“I'm happy to report I am just fine,” he added. “I lost a button.”

The Department of Homeland Security said in a statement that Lander was arrested for assaulting law enforcement and impeding a federal officer – charges that were reportedly dropped.

“It is wrong that politicians seeking higher office undermine law enforcement safety to get a viral moment,” Assistant DHS Secretary Tricia McLaughlin said in a statement. “No one is above the law, and if you lay a hand on a law enforcement officer, you will face consequences.”

Lander denied the allegation, and said he did not expect to be arrested on Tuesday and “certainly did not assault an officer.”

Lander is currently one the arguable frontrunners in the race for mayor, and has been in charge of the city’s coffers since 2022.

The arrest was swiftly condemned by a host of election officials and nearly all his fellow candidates for mayor.

“We need immigrant New Yorkers and Americans across this country to be safe from [President] Trump's ICE agents no matter where they are, be it their apartment building lobby, on their street, on the subway, wherever they are as they move about their lives, because they belong in this country, just as we do,” said Queens Assemblymember and mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani, who recently cross-endorsed with Lander.

Former Governor and mayoral candidate Andrew Cuomo called Lander’s arrest “extreme thuggery.”

“This is not who we are,” he said on social media. “This must stop, and it must stop now.”

Queens Borough President Donovan Richards called it “shameful.”

“It’s all on video — masked agents from a rogue agency arresting individuals without producing a judicial warrant, assaulting onlookers for simply asking for such documentation and intentionally acting with complete disregard for the rule of law they hilariously claim to stand for,” he said.

Mayor Eric Adams did not make a statement until about three hours after Lander’s arrest.

“Today should not be about Brad Lander,” said spokesperson Kayla Mamalek. “It’s about making sure all New Yorkers — regardless of their documentation status — feel safe enough to use public resources, like dialing 911, sending their kids to school, going to the hospital, or attending court appearances, and do not instead hide in the shadows.”

Before getting to Federal Plaza, Hochul had tweeted simply: “This is bull–t.”

Not long after Lander’s arrests, several elected officials arrived at Federal Plaza and entered the building as crowds of protesters began to grow outside.

At around 4:30 p.m., Hochul exited the building with Lander.

“To my knowledge, there are no charges.” Hochul said. “Charges have been dropped. He walks out of there a free man.”

Lander insisted that he was ok, and was treated well after the arrest. The two officers who arrested him were New York City natives, one a Pakistani Muslim Immigrant from Brighton Beach, the other an Indo-Guyanese man who lives in South Ozone Park.

The Comptroller put more of the attention on Edgardo, the man he was escorting, who remains in ICE custody.

“Edgardo is in ICE detention, and he's not going to sleep in his bed tonight.” Lander said. “So far as I know, he has no lawyer. He has been stripped of his due process rights by a government and a judge that owe him a credible fear hearing before they deport him.”

“I will be fine, but Edgardo is not going to be fine, and the rule of law is not fine, and our constitutional democracy is not fine,” he added. “We are not going to allow Donald Trump to wreck the rule of law, to deny people due process and to turn our country into something that doesn't meet its obligations under international law.”