By Laurie Mermet
The Upper West Side’s Community Board 7 voted overwhelmingly Monday night to call for the abolition of the federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agency. The resolution calling for an end to ICE, with 34 board members voting in favor and two abstaining, has no practical effect but is aimed at putting the neighborhood on record in opposition to ICE operations under the Trump administration.
“ICE is not a monolithic federal agency,” said CB7 member Hayden Brockett, a former federal prosecutor and cosponsor, with board member Eric Schmidt, of the resolution.
Brockett noted that ICE was created by Congress in 2003 as part of the Homeland Security Act, consolidating law enforcement duties that had previously been handled by other agencies. “Those law enforcement functions were accomplished very differently before ICE was created, and they can be done differently again,” Brockett told the board.
The board’s resolution declares ICE and U.S. Border Patrol agents “unwelcome” in the neighborhood and calls on Mayor Zohran Mamdani and the City Council to direct the NYPD to push back against federal agents. It also asks state officials in Albany to let New Yorkers sue federal agents for civil rights violations and urges Congress to defund both ICE and the Border Patrol.
“I’ve helped enforce federal laws, including immigration laws,” Brockett told a full room of about 85 attendees. “This background is important for why I think ultimately it’s important to call for the abolition of ICE.”
The resolution points to a string of incidents that Brockett said shows ICE has become dangerous to both new immigrants and American citizens. Among them are the January shootings of two U.S. citizens in Minneapolis: Renee Good, killed by an ICE agent, and Alex Pretti, shot to death by Border Patrol officers during a protest.
The resolution also points to what has been happening in the board’s own backyard.
Federal agents arrested Columbia University student Ellie Agheyeva in February, using the false pretense of searching for a missing child to gain entry to an apartment building on campus, according to an email by the school’s acting President Claire Shipman.
ICE has also been at the center of student activist arrests. In March 2025, agents detained Mahmoud Khalil, a Columbia University student and lead negotiator during the Gaza Solidarity Encampment protests there. Khalil was taken from his campus apartment in Morningside Heights. A month later Columbia student Mohsen Mahdawi – a Palestinian permanent resident – was arrested during what he believed was a routine citizenship interview in Vermont.
The board’s resolution cites statistics from The American Prospect reporting that 46 people died in ICE custody in 2025 and 27 more were killed as a direct result of ICE and Border Patrol actions. In the first month of 2026, eight more people died in DHS custody or at the hands of its agents.
In its conclusions, the resolution says CB7 members believe “that the current mass deportation policy being carried out by ICE at the direction of the Trump Administration is ‘ethnic cleansing,’ because it is disproportionately targeting multiple ethnic groups, that it is causing grave harm to families and communities in our district and across the country, and that it must be halted immediately.”
The vote puts CB7 in company with several elected officials who have made similar calls to end ICE or curb its authority, including District 7 City Councilmember Shaun Abreu, New York State Assemblymember Linda Rosenthal, New York State Assemblymember and congressional candidate Micah Lasher, and New York City Comptroller Mark Levine.
In his presentation to CB7 members, Brockett was careful to draw a distinction between getting rid of the agency and ending immigration enforcement altogether. Combating human trafficking, money laundering, and narcotics still needs to happen, he said; it just shouldn’t continue to be carried out through this agency.
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Virtue signaling. Useless. We need CB to work hard on what city government can address, such as unsafe E-bikes etc.
It’s especially dumb virtue signaling if you pretend you’re against ICE but then constantly go after e-bikes who are all brown and black immigrants. Just boomers trying to pretend they’re not racist when they are.
They’re working on low traffic neighborhoods too.
Totally agree. Stick to your knitting. Control what you can control. This accomplishes absolutely nothing.
It is this kind of sad virtue signaling that Fox News and the like thrive on and it is why MAGA wins elections. They are accomplishing nothing.
Plus, as others have said, “abolishing ICE” is not a good idea. “Reforming ICE” is a good idea. We need some type of enforcement mechanism. Unfortunately, the current one has been weaponized and has no accountability and is out of control. That needs to be fixed. Eliminating it is not a good idea.
Kind of like how a few idiots said “Defund the police” and it was turned into “Democrats want a lawless country with no police.” And this is why we have Donald Trump.
What exactly does “Brockett was careful to draw a distinction between getting rid of the agency and ending immigration enforcement altogether. Combating human trafficking, money laundering, and narcotics still needs to happen, he said; it just shouldn’t continue to be carried out through this agency” mean? Does this mean Brockett hinks that other agencies should deal with people whose visas have expired, who e have deportation orders and/or are not authorized to reside in the US? Or does Brockett mean that immigration enforcement should just occur in the context of human trafficking, money laundering, and narcotics? The language is confusing .
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I am also a little unsure of the thinking here. ICE has arrested people who are seeking asylum and awaiting court dates. What is the proposal for people who do have orders of deportation and are choosing to remain in NYC?
The definition of performative. Accomplishes nothing
Guess you missed the word “symbolic”.
It is symbolic, but so are all these calls for bike lanes, parking removal, low traffic neighborhoods, outdoor dining, parking permits etc. but we defer to them on that. Community boards are for political cover.
Was it a symbolic vote or an actual vote? What was the result? Do we know? The article does not say.
So sad that our community board members are wasting their time on something that is wholly ineffective. They also clearly do not know the law, as they don’t need to ask state officials to sue federal actors. How pathetic that these are the people who are running our district.
Richard Williams was an 83 year old grandfather and veteran shoved off a subway platform at 63rd and Lexington avenue. He was Murdered by an illegal immigrant who had multiple previous arrests. This is what the members of this CB support, an absurd sanctuary city policy that prevents NYPD from turning over criminals like this to ICE. This policy forces ICE to hunt down people in communities, the very thing these people object to! Richard Williams didn’t have to die. His death is directly attributable to our grandstanding politicians and these irresponsible board members.
If Richard Williams (any relation?) had instead been murdered by a native-born American citizen (with both parents also being native-born American citizens, I hasten to add!) with multiple previous arrests, who would you be demonizing instead of immigrants with out-of-order papers? If it had been a Black person, a Jew, a Christian, a women, an indigenous American, a Muslim, a Lower East Sider, a LGBTQ+ person, a Scientologist, a Hindu, a Democrat, a Republican … what vital lesson should one have derived from the incident, and what would be our appropriate response to the grave menace thus represented? Who would we seek to round up, and how?
Dear ECM, Your reply is a false equivalence. I am not saying immigrants are uniquely violent or that an entire group is guilty for one man’s crime. I am saying this case involved a person who, according to public reporting, had been deported four times and had a long criminal history. That makes immigration enforcement directly relevant in a way it would not be if the killer were a citizen. The issue is not identity. It is preventability. Richard Williams would likely be alive if existing immigration law had actually been enforced. Get it?
Well said. Unfortunately your comment will fall on deaf ears in this neighborhood.
I heard it and applaud it.
The resolution does far more than call for abolishing ICE. Among other things it calls for, when lawful, “directing the NYPD to intervene when federal agents engage in conduct that violates the rights of New Yorkers under state and local law (including but not limited to violations of New York laws against illegal search and seizure, illegal detentions, manslaughter, and murder), and urging our DAs to bring criminal charges against federal agents when appropriate under state law. ” It also declares that ICE’s deportations constitute “ethnic cleansing”.
Some of these things are, to put it mildly, not great ideas.
Why are some members participating via Zoom?
Covid is over. If this is something you care about, show up.
Last MONTH in the U.S. there were (at least) 1,129,870 new cases and 11,518 deaths from COVID-19 (source: https://coronavirus.jhu.edu/region/united-states). The figures would no doubt have been substantially higher but for the fact that at least a few Americans continue to find vaccination worthwhile. That COVID-19 is “over” is a widely accepted myth quite useful to political and business interests but not to me.
(And for what it’s worth, I loathe Zoom.)
Fair enough. The Covid emergency is over. Unless these people avoid going outside in general, it really does seem ridiculous to participate remotely these days. If someone takes on a position, they should be available to fully participate in person.
Nothing says like “I care so much about this” than not being bothered to leave your apartment.
actions like this highlight the uselessness of these community boards.
their voting on this is just their participating in a circle jerk.
Next they should fix global inflation by sending a strongly worded email. To the world.
Let’s have a symbolic vote to abolish CB7.
What useless performative nonsense. They may as well have had a spoken word poetry evening. I hope they had fun.
Ah, the West Side Rag Comment Section (TM). Where on some days it’s full of lovely points but most replicate that of the NY Post. :-/
I think the real difference here, all, is if ICE can (if ever, for that matter) restore its integrity and truly commit to its original mission and not act as if it had undenying power over, well, everything. That’s not even just an ethical and moral issue. It’s a legal one and breaks the systems that this country are based on.
This invincibility cloak they donned as a result of “upper management” needs to come off and run like an appropriately ran law enforcement agency. If/when it will, we’ll see.
I think you are missing the point.. It’s not as if most of the commenters are for ICE (or are NY Post readers,) it’s that they are against CB7 wasting time on this performative virtue signaling. It’s what is keeping the UWS in a fantasy land of fairy tales while not addressing real needs. This false choice that one is either a progressive or a fascist is really played out.
:- /
The ethnic cleansing part is over the top. We are talking about people who are in the country illegally, no? Is their point that illegal immigrants of some ethnicities are allowed to stay and illegal immigrants of certain ethnicities are not as a way to keep our illegal population homogenous? I would have more respect if they focused their time on expediting the path to citizenship so we can stop creating sanctuary city work arounds. Along with extended exploitation of people.
Exactly right.
I’m a registered democrat but what has become of the left is mostly disgusting.
They misuse terms like “ethnic cleansing”, “genocide”, “apartheid”, and “fascism” because they either have no clue what they mean or they do but will throw truth out the window to jump on their tribal bandwagon.
What a complete embarrassment.
Of course they have no idea. The first thing they did is destroy education under the guise of justice, equity and other nonsense. NYC alone is an utter, world-class educational embarrassment at $42,000 per student per year. “Educators” who think lowering standards is education have no business anywhere near a school.
This is so stupid it makes the silly “No Kings” look sane ….
https://thefederalist.com/2026/03/30/the-latest-no-kings-protest-is-the-sound-of-a-tired-old-thing-trying-to-not-die/?vcrmeid=zvl4LHs09kme0pBQn0xL3g&vcrmiid=vggP4PrVeU2LpeB35rM6kw
Remember, the national general strike is scheduled for May 1. See you “there”!
Will be working and shopping on Amazon and Walmart that day.
Thanx for the reminder.
Most of us will be working, you know actually contributing to society vs being a taker.
Just as “defund the police” was never actually about defunding the police, “abolish ICE” is not actually about abolishing ICE.
“Defund the police” was about several things, including greater accountability and oversight of the NYPD (and other law enforcement agencies), and re-targeting funds that went to the NYPD to better training, sensitivity courses (or similar), etc. No one ever SERIOUSLY thought that a City would or should literally defund its primary law enforcement agency.
Similarly, “abolish Ice” is not about literally shutting down that arm of the DHS. It is (again) about accountability and oversight, and targeting funds in order to make the agency and its agents work “smarter and safer.” To pull back from the creation of an “American Gestapo,” and require the agents to work fully within the law, and show at least a modicum of respect for the people they encounter (particularly those who are not being “targeted” for enforcement).
Very few people (including on the “left”) actually believe that we should eliminate immigration laws and the agency and agents that enforce them. They simply believe that, like the NYPD at times, ICE is out of control, and many agents have “gone rogue,” ignoring the laws that THEY are required to follow.
So let’s stop with all the “abolish ICE” talk; it may “work” because it fits on a protest sign or bumper sticker, but it is not an accurate statement of what the overwhelming majority of Americans are actually seeking.
I have to disagree with you on this one. For many on the left, including some prominent politicians (and some running for office), “abolish ICE” means exactly that. They want to completely dismantle ICE and shift immigration enforcement to other agencies, such as Customs and Border Patrol.
I don’t know that we can accurately say that the overwhelming majority want to “reform” ICE as opposed to getting rid of it all together.
I did not say that NO ONE is seeking to abolish the agency entirely. I used the phrase “overwhelming majority.” And I did so because in all the interviews with protesters and other “regular” people, with politicians and pundits, and my own anecdotal evidence, it does seem to be the overwhelming majority who are looking for CHANGE in the agency, and not for its actual abolishment. I stand by that based on everything I have seen and heard, both via the media and myself personally.
This is an amazing move if only to trigger the WSR commentariat
Why should any New Yorker in 2026 bother to denounce, symbolically or otherwise, a great and growing evil in our nation? Why should we speak out against our exploding police state when so many neighborhood potholes remain unfilled? Why risk embarrassment by signaling virtue when we can instead go with the flow and signal — or better yet, passively support — vice? Why do all the many people killed, injured, warehoused, or disappeared by ICE, regardless of their immigration or criminal status, really matter so much in the Grand Scheme of Things (and since we’re not among them)? Why isn’t the officially sanctioned influx of affluent white South Africans more than enough for us — why does American need anyone else? Why criticize militarized xenophobia and weaponized sadism with the price of eggs being what it is? Why do something rather than nothing?
Why indeed?
“…has no practical effect…”
That’s an understatement. This symbolic gesture is an embarrassment. It’s nothing more than a childish exercise in self-affirmation. Gestures like this have become a sad excuse for any real community service or action. I’m sure CB7 is proud of itself.
Speaking of ICE, remember all the media attention and hand-wringing over that 5 year old boy who was “detained”? Well, as usual, the original story the media fed us turned out to be false:
https://batyaus.substack.com/p/another-liberal-media-hoax-about?vcrmeid=T1f01gM4i0WhEaXxwmVynw&vcrmiid=vggP4PrVeU2LpeB35rM6kw
Oh, don’t hold your breath for retractions or corrections.
Oh yes, please cite from a writer who has cheerleaded a genocide for the last 2+ years.
“…Meanwhile, Brenda from Accounting is going to sort out climate change by filling out a feedback form.”
Where can we vote to abolish the Community Board?
I can’t help but wish that performative art should be limited to the stage. How about scaffolding, e bikes, potholes, homeless encampments, open air drug using…and the list goes on and on.