Since returning to the White House in January, President Donald Trump has brought many of the lawyers who defended him between terms along for the ride. His former personal attorneys now litter the top ranks of the Justice Department. Alina Habba was a later addition to that group, with Trump naming her as the interim U.S. attorney for New Jersey in March, but she’s trying to make up for lost time in an audacious attempt to use her office against a sitting lawmaker.
Let's focus on the message that the charges Habba sought telegraph about how the Trump administration will handle lawmakers’ attempts at aggressive oversight.
Last month, Rep. LaMonica McIver, D-N.J., got into a confrontation with officials at an Immigrations and Customs Enforcement detention center she was attempting to visit. This week, Habba announced that a federal grand jury handed up charges accusing the congresswoman of assaulting two law enforcement officers during that standoff. In a post on X, Habba framed the charges as part of her job “to ensure that our federal partners are protected when executing their duties.” McIver said in a statement that the indictment was “a brazen attempt at political intimidation” and that she will plead not guilty.
Habba’s statement added that though “people are free to express their views for or against particular policies, they must not do so in a manner that endangers law enforcement and the communities those officers serve.” Let’s leave aside for a moment whether McIver’s actions, which were partially captured on video, truly “endangered” the officers in question. Instead, let’s focus on the message that the charges Habba sought telegraph about how the Trump administration will handle lawmakers’ attempts at aggressive oversight.
As the administration’s mass deportation efforts have ramped up, so have demands from Democratic lawmakers that detainees be treated humanely. Here we hit upon the least controversial part of McIver’s case: As a member of Congress, she had every right to be at the Delaney Hall Federal Immigration Facility in Newark last month. In 2020, Congress passed an appropriations bill that funded DHS (among other agencies) and stipulates that none of its funding “may be used to prevent ... a Member of Congress ... from entering, for the purpose of conducting oversight, any facility operated by or for the Department of Homeland Security used to detain or otherwise house aliens.” The bill, which was reaffirmed last year, also blocks DHS from making any changes to ICE facilities that would give visiting members a false impression of conditions there and stipulates that members don’t have to give notification before they visit.
DHS’ own internal guidance around congressional visits to ICE facilities makes it clear that it’s well aware of the law on this front. There are some limitations, including a requirement that detainees sign privacy releases before meeting with visitors from Capitol Hill. But while congressional staffers must provide 24 hours’ notice before visits, the same isn’t true for members themselves.
Even the initial complaint filed against McIver acknowledged as much, as one of the law enforcement officers told her, “‘Congress people are different,’ indicating members of Congress had lawful authority to be there.”
Yet we’ve seen numerous cases around the country in which ICE officials, not members of Congress, are breaking the law. Over the last week, at least five lawmakers have been turned away from ICE facilities during attempted visits. According to The New York Times, Reps. Adriano Espaillat and Nydia Velázquez of New York, attempting “to investigate reports of overcrowding, stifling heat and migrants sleeping on bathroom floors” at a detention facility in Manhattan, were denied access “because it was a ‘sensitive facility.’”
Habba is no stranger to putting her name on even the most dubious legal efforts.
A spokesperson for DHS said in a statement that the denial was because lawmakers had showed up unannounced and that ICE “would be happy to give them a tour with a little more notice, when it would not disrupt ongoing law enforcement activities and sensitive law enforcement items could be put away.” Again, the language in the law providing DHS’, funding specifically provides for snap visits from House members and the department’s guidance has no “sensitive facilities” exemption to allowing access.
A complicating factor in McIver’s case, though, is that the altercation itself actually wasn’t over her presence at the facility. Instead, it was because she was intervening on behalf of Newark Mayor Ras Bakara, who attempted to enter the facility, as well, at the same time. It was when DHS attempted to remove Bakara that the alleged assault occurred. Habba briefly charged Bakara with misdemeanor trespassing but dropped the charges against him at the same time she opted to move forward with charging McIver. (Bakara is now suing Habba, alleging she “violated his Fourth Amendment right against false arrest and malicious prosecution.”)
The ambiguities involved mean that the Justice Department doesn’t have a particularly strong case against McIver. But Habba is no stranger to putting her name on even dubious legal efforts. She first entered Trump’s orbit in 2021, representing him in a lawsuit against the Times seeking $100 million in damages for alleged defamation. A judge tossed out the case entirely and later ordered Trump to pay the Times nearly $400,000 in legal fees. Nor did the results go her way in the next few civil cases she argued for him, including the E. Jean Carroll defamation case and New York’s fraud case against Trump and his businesses.
If anything, Habba’s reputation with Trump then wasn’t for winning cases but for outspokenly defending him on television. During the New York criminal election interference case, which resulted in a guilty verdict against Trump on 31 counts, she was representing the former president not in court but on the airwaves and the steps outside the court. It’s as a legal spokesperson that she arguably had the greatest success, enough that she was reportedly under consideration to become White House press secretary.
It’s fitting, then, that Habba might not even stick around to complete the case against McIver. Because she is an interim U.S. attorney without Senate confirmation, her position expires 120 days after her appointment. But faithfully arguing the law was never her top priority. It’s attacking Trump’s enemies in the court of public opinion.
And as far as her boss is concerned, an indictment against a sitting congresswoman is sure to be a feather in her cap. Even if the charges against McIver are dropped, she’ll have proved her willingness to go for the jugular in the name of crafting a political narrative. But Democratic lawmakers should be suitably unimpressed — and undeterred — by Habba and her ilk’s legal bullying.
