Reversal: Federal Judge Dismisses DOJ Lawsuit

A federal judge threw out the Justice Department’s lawsuit over Gov. Mikie Sherrill’s Executive Order 12. The order, signed in February, bars ICE from entering or using nonpublic areas of state-owned property without a judicial warrant and forbids using state sites as staging areas, processing locations, or operations bases.

The ruling says New Jersey is not required to help enforce federal immigration law and that Congress set up state cooperation as voluntary. It found no conflict with federal law and said DOJ had not shown ICE would need to “entirely transform” its operations because of the policy.

The opinion also treated New Jersey as a property owner setting rules for its own buildings and noted the policy does not restrict ICE in public areas or on federal, county, or municipal property. With the case dismissed, the executive order remains in force; a separate DOJ challenge to New Jersey’s law enforcement mask ban is still pending.

AI-synthesized from multiple reported sources