Attorney General Pam Bondi announced on Wednesday that the Department of Justice is taking action against the state of New York and its governor, Kathy Hochul.
“This is a new DOJ,” Bondi said. “We sued Illinois. New York did not listen, now you’re next.” According to the attorney general, the state of New York and its top officials were resisting efforts to enforce new immigration laws.
READ: Trump 2.0 highlights growing influence of Indian Americans (January 20, 2025)
Bondi specifically mentioned New York’s Green Light Law, which, according to her, prohibits the state’s sheriff’s department and other agencies from sharing motor vehicle data with federal authorities for purposes of immigration enforcement. “They have a ‘tip-off’ provision that requires New York’s DMV commissioner to promptly inform any illegal alien when a federal immigration agency has requested their information,” Bondi said. “It’s tipping off an illegal alien. And it’s unconstitutional, and that’s why we filed this lawsuit.”
The New York City officials did not take long to respond. Gov. Hochul called Bondi’s “dramatic” media briefing “smoke and mirrors.” The governor said the DOJ filed a “routine civil action” about a law passed in 2019 that has been upheld by the courts in the past.
“Here are the facts: our current laws allow federal immigration officials to access any DMV database with a judicial warrant,” Hochul said in the statement. “That’s a common-sense approach that most New Yorkers support. But there’s no way I’m letting federal agents, or Elon Musk’s shadowy DOGE operation, get unfettered access to the personal data of any New Yorker in the DMV system like 16-year-old kids learning to drive and other vulnerable people.”
READ: Trump stages a triumphant return to power (January 20, 2025)
Meanwhile, New York Attorney General Letitia James released a statement, saying she was prepared to defend “our state laws, including the Green Light law” and protect the rights of all New Yorkers.
The New York Civil Liberties Union (NYCLU) and New York Immigration Coalition (NYIC) President and CEO Murad Awawdehalso criticized the DOJ’s move. Immigration control has been central to Trump’s campaign during the election, and some of his earliest actions in his second term were related to immigration.