New package of immigrant rights bills introduced ahead of Albany Somos

Within days of President Donald Trump’s election in November, New York Democrats descended on Puerto Rico for the annual Somos conference to digest the news. At the time, there was chatter among members of the state Legislature about passing bills to “Trump-proof” New York, with a particular focus on strengthening immigrant protections. Some even said that lawmakers should return before the start of the new year for a special session to pass those measures. 

The time has now come for Albany Somos – the smaller, New York-based conference two months into the legislative session – and lawmakers have not yet taken any action to shore up existing measures. But immigrant protections are still on everyone’s mind, and there’s a renewed urgency as Immigration and Customs Enforcement raids have hit New York, causing fear among immigrant communities around the state. 

That’s why Assembly Member Catalina Cruz is introducing a package of immigration bills for Somos. The most significant part of the package is the Protect Our Schools Act, which would ban ICE from entering schools and prohibit civil arrests on school grounds in the absence of a judicial warrant. If the Protect Our Schools bill passes, New York would be the first state to enact such a measure. 

The new legislation takes cues from the Protect Our Courts Act passed in 2020, which enacted similar protections to prevent arrests in and around courtrooms in the state. It was previously federal government policy for ICE to avoid making arrests at sensitive locations like schools, but the Trump administration abandoned that long-standing policy.

“The sensitive locations agreement lived in a memo, a memo that was an agency memo, and it was never codified into law,” Cruz told City & State. “With our law, what we would be seeking to force the hand of the court not if, (but) when… the federal government will turn around and try to make an example out of us.”

So far, ICE has not made any arrests at schools in New York, but the prospect has immigrants, particularly recent migrants seeking asylum, shaken. Those concerns escalated last month when New York City issued guidance to city agencies allowing them to comply with ICE requests if staff feared for their safety. The language of the city’s memo seemed to leave the door open to permitting immigration agents into schools and other sensitive locations, even without a judicial warrant. The guidance was later walked back, and the city Department of Education sent a letter to parents assuring them that its policy had not changed and ICE would continue not to be allowed on school grounds. 

Even if New York enacts the Protect Our Schools Act, though, enforcement could prove tricky. Hell Gate recently reported that state Chief Administrative Judge Joseph Zayas sent a state court-wide memo instructing staff not to interfere with ICE arrests or other enforcement in courthouses, even if they occur without a judicial warrant. The news of the memo came after Zayas reaffirmed the courts’ commitment to the Protect Our Courts Act during a budget hearing before state lawmakers, during which he acknowledged that some ICE arrests were still taking place in and around courthouses. 

“It is very clear from the behavior of this federal administration that they don’t care about the law,” Cruz said of concerns around enforcement. “But the courts clearly have turned around and said to the administration, ‘We care about the law, and we’re going to make sure that you’re following it.” She didn’t directly opine on the updated guidance from the court system and what that might mean for the enforcement of her legislation.

In addition to the Protect Our Schools Act, Cruz’s package includes two other bills, one that is new and one that Gov. Kathy Hochul previously vetoed. The new legislation would strengthen protections against fraud schemes that often target immigrants seeking legal services. The state had investigated rampant fraud by notary publics who passed themselves off as lawyers, as in the case in some Latin American counties, and reforms were passed. But Cruz said that new forms of exploitative behaviors have emerged in the years since. 

The old bill would codify existing regulations around language access in criminal cases. Hochul vetoed the legislation in the past, citing the existence of those regulations. But Cruz said that those regulations can change at the whim of whoever is in power, so enshrining those requirements in law is important. “This is the kind of thing that has to survive whoever is in leadership,” she said.