ICE wrongly lists Lake Placid, NY as cooperating with immigration officials

The Lake Placid Police Department is working with Immigration and Customs Enforcement to carry out President Donald Trump’s mass deportation agenda. Lake Placid, Florida, that is. But until recently, ICE had listed Lake Placid, New York, as having signed a cooperation agreement to cooperate with the agency. After City & State inquired about the mix-up, ICE quietly corrected the mistake.

Municipalities around the country are able to sign what are known as 287(g) agreements with ICE in order to set up formal cooperation between local law enforcement and federal immigration officials. Numerous towns, counties and village law enforcement agencies, especially in conservative states, have signed agreements to work with ICE. But such agreements are much less common in blue states in New York.

Nassau County made headlines last month when Republican County Executive Bruce Blakeman announced that the local sheriff’s department had signed a 287(g) agreement. That was only the second agreement in New York and the first in the state since Trump took office again. Thanks to a 2018 state court ruling, local law enforcement in New York can only honor ICE detainer requests if their department has signed a 287(g) agreement with ICE.

As late as March 6, the ICE spreadsheet of 287(g) agreements listed “Lake Placid Police Department” in “New York” as a law enforcement agency that had agreed to employ what’s known as the “task force model.” According to the document, officials signed the agreement on Feb. 28.

The task force model goes further than others in deputizing local law enforcement, allowing them to effectively act as immigration officials, including inquiring about people’s immigration status regardless of the presence of a warrant. Former President Barack Obama discontinued the use of the task force model in 2012 due to controversies around its implementation, particularly in Maricopa County, Arizona. Trump reinstated its use after becoming president.

The North Country village of Lake Placid is most famous for hosting the 1980 Winter Olympic Games. It is hardly known for its abundance of immigrants, documented or otherwise, and is generally a liberal area. To sign the most severe of the 287(g) agreements would have been significant for the state of New York. But the police department there hadn’t – ICE mixed it up with Florida.

A call to the Lake Placid Police Department upstate was initially met with confusion from local officials, who weren’t aware of any agreements with ICE. The person who first answered the phone asked whether City & State was actually trying to get in touch with Lake Placid in Florida. Similarly, an official at the Florida Lake Placid Police Department said they were often confused with their New York counterpart, but added that he believed the agency had signed an agreement with ICE. 

City & State first inquired with ICE about the apparent mistake on March 4. Lake Placid, New York, remained on the agency spreadsheet for at least two more days, until City & State inquired again on March 6. By the next morning, Lake Placid, Florida, had been added to the spreadsheet. And Lake Placid, New York, had been removed. 

An ICE spokesperson did not immediately respond to a request for comment about the change.