SANCTUARY INSANITY: DHS Slams New York Sanctuary Politicians for Releasing Illegal Alien from Jail After Assaulting a Police Officer

This illegal alien was RELEASED into the country by the Biden Administration

WASHINGTON - The United States Department of Homeland Security (DHS) released the following statement condemning sanctuary politicians in New York for denying a detainer lodged by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) against an illegal alien arrested for aggravated assault on a police officer with a deadly weapon.

On October 7, ICE lodged a detainer with Queens Central Booking for Alpha Bah, an illegal alien from Guinea, after he had been arrested the same day for the charges of aggravated assault on a police officer with a deadly weapon, resisting arrest, obstruct governmental administration, and intent to obtain transportation without paying.

The New York City Police Department (NYPD) did not honor the detainer and chose to RELEASE Bah from jail without notifying ICE. He remains at large.

Bah had previously been arrested by the NYPD twice before. He was arrested on June 15, 2026, and charged with intent to obtain transportation without paying. ICE lodged a detainer with Manhattan Central Booking, but the NYPD refused to honor the detainer and released him. More than a year earlier, Bah was arrested on January 5, 2025, and charged with criminal trespass. He was released before ICE could lodge a detainer.

"This illegal alien from Guinea was arrested for assaulting a police officer with a deadly weapon. Despite these violent charges, New York City sanctuary politicians refused to honor ICE's detainer and RELEASED him back onto the streets, and he remains at large," said DHS Secretary Markwayne Mullin. "This is the vision of sanctuary politicians in a nutshell: the open-border policies of the Biden Administration let this criminal into our country, and then sanctuary politicians in New York released him after arresting him without notifying ICE. DHS is calling on Governor Kathy Hochul and Mayor Zohran Mamdani to knock it off with these evil sanctuary policies before another American gets hurt, or worse."

Bah illegally entered the United States through Arizona in November 2023 and was arrested by the U.S. Border Patrol. He was then RELEASED into the country by the Biden Administration.

The latest ICE data reveals that from January 20, 2025, to October 8, 2026, 16,070 detainers were not honored by the state of New York. There are 52,503 total criminal charges and convictions associated with these detainers, including:

• Homicides: 131
• Kidnappings: 132
• Sexual offenses: 1,017
• DUIs: 1,561
• Burglaries: 1,631
• Robberies: 1,776
• Weapons offenses: 2,198
• Dangerous drugs: 4,324
• Assaults: 9,502

New York City's Mayor Zohran Mamdani signed an Executive Order turning New York City into a shield for violent criminal illegal aliens to reoffend and create more innocent victims.

In December 2025, then-Acting ICE Director Todd Lyons sent a letter to New York Attorney General Letitia James, along with the attorneys general of California and Illinois, putting her on notice for the state's failure to honor ICE detainers. In response, New York Governor Kathy Hochul punished local law enforcement who did cooperate with ICE by proposing legislation that would bar local police departments from partnering and cooperating with ICE law enforcement, which she signed into law in May 2026. The law took effect on August 25, 2026.

Under Governor Hochul, New York has become a hotbed of illegal alien crime. Some of the recent illegal alien crimes in the sanctuary state include:

• In October, ICE arrested Rudi and Mirabela Lacatusu, an illegal alien couple from Romania, after they were charged with grand larceny for carrying out more than a dozen jewelry thefts across four states. Nassau County Police turned them over to ICE custody.
• In October, two illegal aliens from the Dominican Republic, Dangelo Rafael Jean Caraballo and Sneider Mejia Bautista, repeatedly stabbed an off-duty NYPD detective in an attempted robbery. Both suspects had previously been arrested in New York for crimes including reckless endangerment, reckless driving, possession of burglar's tools, grand larceny, and criminal possession of a controlled substance, among other crimes, but both had been released before ICE could lodge detainers.
• In June, ICE lodged a detainer for Aureliano Antonio Melendez Reyes, an illegal alien from El Salvador, after he was arrested for raping a 16-year-old girl in Huntington, New York.
• In April, the New York City Department of Corrections refused to honor an ICE detainer for Roman Ceron Amatitla, an illegal alien from Mexico, who was charged with murder and arson in Queens County, New York.
• In March, ICE arrested Bryan David Tasiguano Leon, an illegal alien from Ecuador and Latin Kings gang member, who had been released by New York sanctuary politicians despite being charged with assault.
• In March, ICE lodged a detainer for Bairon Posada-Hernandez, a four-time deported illegal alien from Honduras, after he was arrested for shoving two bystanders, including an 83-year-old Air Force veteran, onto subway tracks in New York City. The Air Force veteran, Richard Williams, later died of his injuries.
• In January, ICE arrested Rafael Andres Rubio Bohorquez, an illegal alien from Venezuela, who was working as a New York City Council employee despite having a criminal history that includes an arrest for assault.
• In January, ICE arrested Gerardo Miguel-Mora, an illegal alien from Mexico, after he had been released by New York sanctuary politicians despite having a criminal history that includes arrests for strangulation, rape, sexual assault, burglary, grand larceny, and drug possession.
• In April 2025, ICE lodged a detainer for Felix Jeronimo-Rojas, an illegal alien from Mexico, after he was arrested for raping and robbing a corpse on a New York City subway. Jeronimo-Rojas was sentenced in June 2026 to five years in prison.

In addition to the crimes committed by illegal aliens in New York, the state's sanctuary policies have had disastrous consequences in other states as well. These include:

• In September, ICE arrested Simranpal Singh, an illegal alien from India, in Pennsylvania who had been issued a Commercial Driver's License (CDL) by Hochul's New York.
• In March, ICE arrested Sukhdev Singh, an illegal alien from India, after he caused a crash while driving a semi-truck that left a U.S. citizen hospitalized in critical condition in Indianapolis, Indiana. Singh had been given a CDL by Hochul's New York.
• In October 2025, ICE arrested Anmol Anmol, an illegal alien from India, in Oklahoma. Hochul's New York had given Anmol a CDL that listed him as "No Name Given Anmol."
• In August 2023, New York City Police Department (NYPD) officers arrested Jose Antonio Ibarra, an illegal alien from Venezuela and Tren de Aragua gang member, for recklessly driving a motorcycle with a 2-year-old child who was not wearing a helmet. He was released due to New York's sanctuary policies, and six months later, Ibarra went on to murder nursing student Laken Riley in Georgia in February 2024.

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