US justice department sues New York over immigration rules | US immigration

The US attorney general announced on Wednesday that the Trump administration is suing New York state over its immigration policies, accusing state officials of choosing “to prioritize illegal aliens over American citizens”.

Standing in front of federal agents who have been tasked with helping in Trump’s immigration crackdown, Pam Bondi echoed the president’s rhetoric as she vowed the justice department would take on communities that thwart federal immigration efforts.

Bondi said she was out to end New York’s “green light” law, which allows people in the state to get a driver’s license without citizenship or legal residency status. The law was enacted partly to improve public safety on the roads, as people without licenses sometimes drove without one, or without having passed a road test. The state also makes it easier for holders of such licenses to get auto insurance, thus cutting down on crashes involving uninsured drivers.

“It stops,” Bondi said. “It stops today.”

The lawsuit describes the law as “a frontal assault on the federal immigration laws, and the federal authorities that administer them”. It highlights a provision that requires the state’s department of motor vehicles commissioner to inform people who are in the country illegally when a federal immigration agency has requested their information. The justice department is asking the court to strike down the law. (Although the suit is civil, not criminal, Bondi caused confusion by saying that the justice department had “filed charges” against the state of New York.)

Bondi made the announcement alongside Tammy Nobles, whose 20-year-old daughter was killed in Aberdeen, Maryland, in July 2022 by someone from El Salvador who had entered the country illegally months earlier in Texas.

Bondi’s politically charged rhetoric, unusual for an institution that has historically been wary of aligning itself so directly with the White House, and the selection of legal targets raise fresh concerns that she could seek to use the agency’s law enforcement powers to go after the president’s adversaries. James, the New York attorney general, has drawn Trump’s ire by suing him, leading to a civil fraud judgment that stands to cost Trump nearly $500m.

James said in a statement that she’s prepared to defend the state’s laws, which she said “protect the rights of all New Yorkers and keep our communities safe”.

The lawsuit comes days after the justice department sued the city of Chicago, alleging that its “sanctuary” laws were thwarting federal efforts to enforce immigration laws.