NEW YORK — President Donald Trump’s border czar joined New York City’s mayor on Tuesday to tout new federal charges against 27 people accused of being Tren de Aragua gang members and associates.
The joint announcement is the latest example of the close ties between Mayor Eric Adams and the Trump administration, which recently dropped federal corruption charges against the Democrat so he could better focus on the Republican president’s immigration priorities. Adams is now running for reelection as an independent.
Trump, in his nationwide immigration crackdown, has labeled Tren de Aragua an invading force as he invoked the Alien Enemies Act, a little-used statute from 1798 lets the president deport noncitizens 14 years or older who are from a country the U.S. is at war with.
“Every member of TDA should be on the run,” declared Thomas Homan, Trump’s border czar, referring to the initials of the gang, which originated in Venezuela more than a decade ago and has been linked to a series of kidnappings, extortion and other crimes throughout the Western Hemisphere.
Adams’ administration recently announced that it would let federal immigration officials operate at the city’s Rikers Island jail complex — and Homan used the news briefing to take a swipe at a City Council lawsuit seeking to stop the plan.
“This is what collaboration looks like,” he said. “I never asked the city or the NYPD to be immigration officers. I asked them to work with us on significant public safety threats and national security threats, and that’s what we’re committed to doing.”
A New York judge ordered city officials on Monday to temporarily halt the plan, which would let Immigration and Customs Enforcement and other federal agencies establish offices at the massive lockup, until an April 25 hearing on the suit.
Adams said Tuesday’s announcement showed he remains “unapologetic” in his desire to rid the city’s streets of violent immigrant gangs.
“The question that we must answer: whose side are you on?” the Democrat said. “Are you on the side of those who are carrying these illegal guns, wreaking havoc, sex trafficking, harming innocent people regardless of their documentation, or are you on the side of hardworking New Yorkers and Americans? I’m clear on which side I’m on.”
Manhattan prosecutors say the case is the first to bring federal racketeering charges, which were famously used to bring down the Mafia, against the Venezuelan street gang. The more than two dozen accused also face charges including sex trafficking, drug trafficking, robbery, and firearms possession.
Prosecutors said those arrested smuggled young women from Venezuela into Peru and the U.S. The women, who they referred to as “multadas,” paid off their debts through prostitution and were threatened with violence and death.
The gang members also committed armed robberies and smuggled illegal drugs, including a substance called “tusi” that contains ketamine, prosecutors said.
Of the 27 charged, 21 are in custody, including five arrested Monday and Tuesday in operations in New York and elsewhere, they said. Six others remain at large.
The charges are broken out into two separate indictments, one for six alleged members of Tren de Aragua and the other charging 19 alleged members of “Anti-Tren,” a splinter faction made up of former Tren members.
Among those named in Tuesday’s indictment was Anderson Zambrano-Pacheco, who was among those arrested back in January in the Bronx during some of the Trump administration’s first efforts to ramp up immigration enforcement in the city.
Authorities say the 26-year-old was part of a group of heavily armed men seen in a now-viral video forcing their way into an apartment in Aurora, Colorado, raising fears that Tren de Aragua was in control of the rundown complex in the Denver suburbs.
Zambrano-Pacheco’s lawyer didn’t immediately comment Tuesday.
Adams rejected the notion that many of those apprehended by immigration and law enforcement officials in recent months are otherwise law-abiding people.
“The American dream is not doing armed robberies. The American dream is not discharging guns. The American dream is not shooting at police officers. The American dream is not going into homeless shelters and taking the documentation from innocent people and forcing them into sex trafficking,” he said. “That’s not the American dream, and we’re not going to be a safe harbor for criminals.”
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Follow Philip Marcelo at twitter.com/philmarcelo.
