Mamdani calls for ICE to leave New York after Marble Hill shooting

Oscar Belgal, 28, held at Brooklyn detention center after shooting

New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani on Sunday called for US Immigration and Customs Enforcement to end operations in his city, comparing videos of a Thursday shooting by ICE agents in the Manhattan enclave of Marble Hill to a mass shooting scene. Mamdani made the remarks in his first media interview since the shooting, joining MS NOW’s Jacob Soboroff.

In the interview, the mayor described his perspective on videos that have emerged since the shooting. “What you can see in that video and the videos that have been released since, people, bystanders outside [are] unsure as to what they were even seeing because in that imagery — it feels like you’re looking at a mass shooter as opposed to seeing someone who is reportedly representing a federal agency,” Mamdani said.

The mayor said it was unclear even to him that the agents in the footage were law enforcement personnel, citing their plainclothes appearance. “There is a reason why law enforcement agents are supposed to wear identifiable information and uniforms,” Mamdani said. He additionally contended that ICE agents “view the law as a suggestion,” alluding to the New York Police Department’s prohibition on officers firing at someone in a vehicle in most circumstances.

ICE agents shot and wounded Oscar Belgal, 28, during the Thursday enforcement operation. Belgal was struck in the neck while his five-year-old child sat inside the vehicle. The child was physically unharmed and was left in the care of family members.

Belgal remained in custody as of the Sunday interview, according to Mamdani. During a court hearing for Belgal on Friday, attorneys said he had been booked into the Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn, which is newly being used to detain immigrants. Belgal had previously been temporarily brought to a privately run ICE facility in New Jersey after being discharged from the hospital where he received treatment for the gunshot wound.

Mamdani said he spoke with President Donald Trump and Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin on Thursday evening. The mayor reiterated that he sees no place for ICE in New York City despite Trump’s mass deportation agenda, which Trump has pursued throughout his second presidency. Mamdani said he made clear that the NYPD would be conducting a review into Belgal’s shooting and its aftermath, which saw large street protests.

The Thursday shooting in Marble Hill — a neighborhood geographically in the Bronx but considered part of Manhattan — came as ICE arrests reached record levels. The agency achieved those numbers after pivoting from the high-profile operations it carried out in 2025 to more quietly dispatching agents into communities across the US.

Since Trump returned to office in early 2025, US immigration officers have shot at least two dozen people, according to one analysis cited by The Guardian. That figure includes three US citizens who were killed.