New York
Trump’s Immigration Crackdown Pervades Long Island Suburbs
The sun poked above the horizon one bright March morning in the sprawling suburbs of Long Island. A fleet of federal vehicles began their daily search for immigrants.
They were followed, as usual, by Osman Canales, the roving neighborhood watch leader who has 100,000 Facebook followers and an entourage of secret lookouts. With one hand on the wheel of his black Jeep Grand Cherokee and another gripping a bullhorn, he telegraphed a warning:
“ICE is here!” Mr. Canales shouted in Spanish. “Stay home!”
President Trump’s immigration crackdown has played out most graphically in big cities run by Democrats, where aggressive tactics by federal agents have dominated headlines and fanned partisan debate. But in those cities, immigrant arrest rates have been erratic, spiking and plummeting.
The rhythm of detentions has been more steady in car-dependent places like Long Island, where agents have the advantage of stealth and where immigrants live far from the eye of news cameras. Just east of New York City’s jampacked boroughs, the arrest rates since last August have been consistently higher than in the city and the Hudson Valley.
The detention rate on Long Island has been about 60 percent higher than in the city and Hudson Valley since Mr. Trump took office. The rate remains slightly lower than in the rest of the country.
The expansive roads of Long Island have been fertile terrain for agents to capture migrants without the scrutiny that has often accompanied officials’ actions in big cities. Residents must drive for miles to get to work or to go grocery shopping, allowing officers to detain them during traffic stops beyond the critical eye of observers.
“It’s harder to say something when you’re in your car driving in a suburban area,” said Serena Martin, an immigration advocate and the executive director of New Hour for Women and Children, an organization that helps mothers, women and children whose lives have been affected by incarceration. “It’s not that people care any less. We just aren’t on the street walking in the way that people in urban areas have the ability to do to quickly mobilize, to take the photos, to take the video.”
On Long Island, Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents arrested about 12 people a day in early March, compared with about one a day in 2024. Nationwide, ICE agents were making more than 1,000 arrests per day in early March, compared with about 300 a day in 2024.
Deep-blue cities such as Chicago, Minneapolis and New York have vowed not to work with ICE, and protesters there have foiled large immigration operations by leaping quickly into action in substantial numbers. Federal agents in Manhattan have sometimes struggled to carry out arrests. Activists have chased them during a street raid, barricaded a garage where they were parked and staged a protest at a hotel where they were staying.
The pace of immigration arrests in the New York City area has remained at an elevated level since last summer — a contrast to the operations in Chicago and Minneapolis, where arrests skyrocketed for a month or two and then calmed down.
Arrests in Illinois fell from about 70 a day in October 2025 to about 10 a day at the beginning of March. In Minnesota, they fell from more than 80 a day in January to just about three a day. At the same time, arrests in the New York City area went from about 30 a day in January to about 28 a day in early March.
The Department of Homeland Security declined to discuss operations, but officials suggested that cities choosing to cooperate with ICE have less crime.
“Partnerships with law enforcement are critical to having the resources we need to arrest criminal illegal aliens across the country,” D.H.S. said in a statement. “We have had tremendous success when local law enforcement work with us.”
In Nassau County, the Long Island county closer to New York City, federal agents are aided by a partnership between local police and the Trump administration that empowers law enforcement officers to assist in enforcing immigration laws and transfer people into ICE custody. The agreement is known as Section 287(g) of the U.S. Immigration and Nationality Act. And Nassau County isn’t alone.
A growing number of 287(g) agreements have been adopted across the country since Mr. Trump returned to office. In January 2025, 133 state and local agencies had agreements, according to a study by the American Civil Liberties Union. Since then, ICE has announced agreements with at least 1,000 agencies.
Bruce Blakeman, the Nassau County executive who is the Republican nominee for New York governor and an ally of Mr. Trump’s, has vowed to fight a proposal by Gov. Kathy Hochul, a Democrat, to ban officers from working with ICE through 287(g) agreements. Mr. Blakeman has passed several policies to help federal agents, including the deployment of local detectives to assist with deportations.
“Because of the county’s cooperation with ICE, we have removed over 2,000 illegal migrants with criminal records ranging from attempted murder, to rape, to car jacking and drug dealing,” said Chris Boyle, a spokesman for Mr. Blakeman. “It is a safer county.”
ICE agents have turned Nassau County’s fire stations into rest stops, pulling into parking lots to take a break from patrolling. Sandra Valencia, who runs a youth leadership program on Long Island through Rural & Migrant Ministry, an advocacy group, said that agents park outside schools after classes are released, frightening parents.
“Children of Republican parents have intimidated our kids,” Ms. Valencia said in Spanish. “They showed up to school with American flags.”
Latinos on Long Island have accused ICE of discrimination. In a lawsuit filed April 8, five residents of Latino descent said that agents unlawfully stopped and arrested them based solely on their race and ethnicity, with no regard for their immigration status, in violation of federal laws and regulations. The agency did not respond to an inquiry about the litigation.
Long Islanders have made plans in the event of their own arrest, asking family members to take care of relatives or property left behind. One woman who is living in the country illegally and spoke on the condition of anonymity because she feared reprisal said that in June, she decided to pack a bag with blankets, mittens, hats and a sleep sack for her 1-year-old baby in case they wound up in a frigid detention center.
Teenagers said they have felt shocked to see families unravel around them. Some said they worried that losing a parent or a sibling would risk their academic pursuits or deplete their family’s income.
Fernanda Mejia, 16, is the daughter of a bagel store worker who was detained in June while agents were searching for another person. In a tearful plea to the Republican-controlled Nassau County Legislature in July, she said that she was heartbroken to lose her father and urged the governing body to stop helping ICE arrest migrants like him. She said her father had no history of criminal behavior, and The New York Times found no evidence of a criminal background.
“My name is Fernanda Mejia,” she said, her voice trembling as she approached the lectern while wearing a ruffled skirt and a pink bow in her hair. “My dad was taken by ICE.”
Howard J. Kopel, the presiding officer, cut her off, drawing protests from audience members who demanded to hear more. When Fernanda finished speaking, Mr. Kopel was terse.
“I wish you good luck,” Mr. Kopel said. “I hope it works out. All right, next.”
Mr. Kopel declined an interview request through a spokeswoman.
Fernanda’s father had been deported to El Salvador. In her messy bedroom, piled with stuffed animals, makeup brushes and Polaroids, she keeps the gifts he sent from detention — a bracelet that he spooled together with broken rosaries and a necklace made out of beads shaped from bread.
Many adults around Fernanda barely go outside. Some depend on Facebook posts from Mr. Canales, the neighborhood watch leader.
On that bright March morning, Mr. Canales drove for hours before he found out agents had quietly arrested someone. He stopped for lunch at a Mexican restaurant, where the owner thanked him with a free torta and lamented a lack of customers.
Defeated, Mr. Canales finished eating, climbed back into his Jeep and braced for the next day.
Sheelagh McNeill contributed research.
new video loaded: Protesters Clash with Federal Agents Outside ICE Detention Center in New Jersey
transcript
transcript
Protesters Clash with Federal Agents Outside ICE Detention Center in New Jersey
Protesters and immigration agents clashed outside Delaney Hall detention center in Newark, where activists have gathered for days to denounce conditions inside.
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“Get back!” “Get back, get back, get back, get back, get back!” [chanting] “ICE, ICE has got to go. Hey, hey, ho, ho.” “We’ve heard repeatedly about these horror stories of pregnant women not getting access to care, of people with injuries not being treated. People shouldn’t have to starve themselves to make their dignity known.” “Down, down with the degradation.” “Down, down with the degradation.”
By Christina Kelso
May 28, 2026
How can people possibly afford to live in one of the most expensive cities on the planet? It’s a question New Yorkers hear a lot, often delivered with a mix of awe, pity and confusion.
We surveyed hundreds of New Yorkers about how they spend, splurge and save. We found that many people — rich, poor or somewhere in between — live life as a series of small calculations that add up to one big question: What makes living in New York worth it?
Ellen Hagan grew up in a small town in Kentucky, and moved to New York City as quickly as she could after she graduated from college. She arrived a few weeks before Sept. 11, and tried to get her bearings in a city turned upside down.
She found a group of fellow young artists and writers who wanted to take advantage of everything they could in the city, on very limited budgets. They went to poetry readings and dance parties, and rented tiny apartments in the East Village.
All the while, Ms. Hagan was diligent about saving money, even when she had very little of it.
“I didn’t know what I was saving for, but I knew I wasn’t going to have a job that would give me a pension,” she said. “I wanted to make enough money to live the New York existence I was dreaming of.”
Twenty-five years later, Ms. Hagan and her husband, David Flores, whom she started dating in her early years in New York, have much more money than they used to. Still, they feel more anxious about money than they hoped they would at this point in their lives.
The couple both work at DreamYard, a Bronx arts nonprofit. Last year, they made $178,135 there collectively, with Ms. Hagan, 47, directing the poetry and theater programs, and Mr. Flores, also 47, serving as the head of visual art and design.
They typically bring in another $40,000 to $60,000 a year through their freelance work. Mr. Flores is an adjunct professor, a photographer and a filmmaker, and Ms. Hagan teaches at a graduate writing program and writes books and poetry. They try to set aside about 15 percent of their income each year to grow their savings.
The couple live in Washington Heights in Upper Manhattan with their two daughters, who are 12 and 15.
Homeownership Doesn’t Solve Everything
As a young couple, Ms. Hagan and Mr. Flores lived in a 400-square-foot East Village rental. When their rent started to tick up, Ms. Hagan began looking for a place to buy, seeing homeownership as a buoy that would all but guarantee a secure financial life in New York.
Sixteen years ago, the couple found a perfect apartment in Washington Heights and scrambled to cobble together a down payment. They pooled their savings to put a 15 percent down payment on the $335,000 home. Once they closed, they were left with only a few hundred dollars in savings, but were thrilled and relieved.
“I had this sense that when you buy, you’re set in New York City,” Ms. Hagan said.
The reality, she has found, is more complicated.
The couple’s mortgage payment is $1,300 a month, and their maintenance fees keep rising, partially as a result of a new local law that requires increased inspections and repairs for buildings. Local Law 11 boosted their maintenance by $462 a month, at least temporarily, to about $1,900 total. And when the building’s management installed a new security system, each unit had to chip in $95 a month for three months.
Ms. Hagan loves the apartment, but she worries that they may eventually be priced out of their neighborhood.
“This building isn’t going to be for us at some point,” she said. “This feels like, uh oh, they’re imagining people who have much higher incomes than we do.”
Keeping the Kids Busy
Ms. Hagan and Mr. Flores, who each maintain packed calendars, have encouraged their daughters to adopt the same approach to city living.
“I’m definitely a proponent of, let’s fill your schedule and see what you love,” Ms. Hagan said.
The girls’ public school offers free debate and band classes before and after school, and they’ll appear this spring in the school’s productions of “Annie” and “The Addams Family.”
The girls are also enrolled in a free theater academy at the People’s Theatre and writing workshops at Uptown Stories, which has a pay-what-you-can system. Ms. Hagan and Mr. Flores typically pay the full tuition, which is $800 for each 12-week session, and donate about $2,500 a year to the organizations their daughters are part of.
The couple’s older daughter, Araceli, who wants to be both a writer and a doctor, is enrolled in a medical training program for middle and high school students. She made $2,500 for completing an internship at a cardiothoracic intensive care unit last summer.
Their younger daughter, Miriam, is going to a Y.M.C.A. camp this summer, which costs $2,600 for two weeks.
Ms. Hagan and Mr. Flores spent about $500 total on holiday gifts for both girls, and the couple doles out their daughters’ weekly allowances in two installments: $25 on Mondays and $25 on Fridays.
They shook their heads when Miriam, who is known as the most stylish member of the family, came home one day wearing a Dr Pepper T-shirt she’d bought at Target.
“We were like, ‘What are you doing with your money?’” Ms. Hagan said.
The Fun Stuff
The extra income from the couple’s freelance work allows the family to splurge on theater, vacations, books and memberships at the Museum of Modern Art and the Whitney Museum of American Art.
Sometimes, Ms. Hagan and Mr. Flores work together. A few years ago, they sold a young adult novel called “Tell Me Every Lie” they had co-written for a $35,000 advance, some of which went to their agent.
Every little bit helps. The family is spending a weekend on Long Beach Island in New Jersey this summer, which will cost about $3,500. That price tag includes a hotel room big enough for four.
The family typically travels twice a year to Kentucky, where both Ms. Hagan and Mr. Flores are from, and where the couple co-owns a home in Louisville with Mr. Flores’s parents. They put $40,000 down and spend about $12,000 annually on expenses related to the home.
The family was hoping to travel to the Philippines this year, where Mr. Flores’s father is from, but they realized it could cost as much as $15,000. The trip is now on hold indefinitely.
They spend about $700 a month on groceries from nearby supermarkets, and occasionally order grocery deliveries from FreshDirect.
Every Wednesday, when the girls come home late from theater class, someone picks up dinner at the nearby halal truck or the Dominican restaurant Malecon, which usually runs about $60.
Dinner out as a family of four can easily cost $200, so Ms. Hagan and Mr. Flores typically eat at restaurants just once or twice a month. The other night, the whole family was hungry and craved Italian food from a favorite upscale spot nearby.
They balked, and walked around the corner to a diner instead. The meal was $120, all in.
We are talking to New Yorkers about how they spend, splurge and save.
Gov. Mikie Sherrill of New Jersey, a Democrat who has clashed with the Trump administration over immigration policies, joined protests outside a detention center in Newark on Monday in support of detainees participating in a hunger strike.
Ms. Sherrill heard from family members of detainees, who have complained about rotten and spoiled food and inadequate medical care at Delaney Hall. Dozens of protesters waved signs, banged on drums, and chanted “Free Them All!” The governor told the crowd she had requested access but was denied.
“No matter what your immigration status is, you shouldn’t be treated with anything less than dignity in this country,” said Ms. Sherrill, who was dressed in a T-shirt, jeans, and blue-gray jacket on the Memorial Day holiday. At one point, she rested her hand on the shoulder of a crying relative and smoothed the hair of an upset child.
After the governor left, the scene worsened outside the detention facility. A tense standoff erupted between Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents and protesters who blocked an entrance; the agents responded by firing pepper balls and spray at the protesters. Senator Andy Kim, who was trying to de-escalate the situation, was among those affected.
On Monday, the governor and other elected officials, including Mayor Ras J. Baraka of Newark, appeared outside Delaney Hall amid growing concerns over the hunger strike, which started on Friday inside the gray, cinder-block building enclosed by a high chain link fence topped with razor wire.
Immigration advocates have rallied outside Delaney Hall since Friday. Detainees said they would go on a hunger and labor strike while calling for an investigation of the detention center and its operations and for Ms. Sherrill to visit to discuss protections from ICE. Hundreds of detainees were participating, one protester told Ms. Sherrill.
The governor said in a statement on Sunday that she had contacted ICE to gain access to the detention center and was working to monitor the situation and “do what’s necessary to ensure humane conditions.”
At Monday’s protest, some protesters shouted in Ms. Sherrill’s face to criticize her for not showing up earlier in the weekend, like other elected officials had.
Representative Rob Menendez of New Jersey had arrived at 8 p.m. on Sunday and stayed all night until he was allowed into the center on Monday morning. Mr. Menendez said that he had spoken to some of the detainees inside Delaney Hall, including a young woman who just wanted to go to her high school graduation, a pregnant woman who was trying to get medical care, and a man who showed him a carton of milk that had gone rancid.
“I heard just desperation from so many people in there,” Mr. Menendez said afterward.
Angela Martinez told Ms. Sherrill that her cousin, Bolivar Bueno, 65, has diabetes and that she hasn’t been able to speak to him to make sure he is getting medication. “We don’t know what’s going on,” she told the governor.
Afterward, Ms. Martinez said, “I want for her to help me out.”
Ms. Sherrill left after about an hour, around 11:30 a.m., as some demonstrators jeered at her. Her security had to clear the road of a couple people who tried to stop her S.U.V. from leaving.
A few hours later, a convoy of ICE vehicles approached another entrance on the south side of Delaney Hall. Protesters, who had rallied at the north entrance in the morning, ran over to sit down in front of the vehicles. Many said they feared that the detainees on hunger strike inside would be transferred to other facilities.
ICE agents — most of whom were wearing face masks — pushed and shoved the protesters out of the way, even dragging one young man by a kaffiyeh around his neck. As the protesters chanted “Trump Has To Go,” they linked arms and faced the ICE agents.
The standoff prevented anyone from leaving through the south entrance. Soon after, a military-style vehicle moved toward that entrance, with a man on top holding a firearm pointed at demonstrators.
Senator Kim, Democrat of New Jersey, who had been allowed inside Delaney Hall, came out during the confrontation and walked over to support the protesters. Soon afterward, the ICE agents and military vehicles backed away from the entrance and slightly retreated toward to the detention center, but the standoff continued.
“They provoked it, they brought that tank over,” Mr. Kim said. “It’s getting worse and worse here.”
The senator said he was working to “de-escalate” the standoff through negotiations with federal officials and would push for families to be allowed to visit detainees as early as Tuesday. “I’m going to keep at it,” he said.
Not long after, the standoff escalated with ICE agents using pepper balls and mace on the crowd.
It’s not the first time Delaney Hall has faced protests. In June 2025, four men escaped from the detention center after days of unrest over meager and sporadic meals and overcrowding that forced some detainees to sleep on the floor. Detainees had smashed windows, doors and security cameras.
And Mr. Baraka, the Newark mayor, was arrested in May 2025 during a clash with federal agents outside its gates last year.
Dakota Santiago contributed reporting.
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