WASHINGTON — Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin revealed Friday that New York officials have refused to honor a single detainer request from his department for illegal immigrants in their custody, many of whom have “extensive criminal backgrounds.”
The Department of Homeland Security has issued 14,766 detainers to New York law enforcement entities, Mullin noted, for migrants accused of a total of 47,750 felony charges.
At least 258 foreign nationals are being held currently on murder charges, the secretary also said.
“Silence. Absolute silence is what we’ve got from New York off of those retainers,” Mullin told reporters at DHS headquarters.
“So you have to ask yourself, why would they release these individuals back onto the streets? They’re illegals,” he added. “They have no right to be back into the United States. They’ve committed a crime. We know that they’re the worst.”
Mullin also accused so-called “sanctuary politicians” of having enabled “criminal activity to thrive, not for the American citizens to be safe” and took New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani to task for having said nothing about the off-duty stabbing of an NYPD officer last week, allegedly by an illegal immigrant.
The comments came hours after an Immigration and Customs Enforcement-involved shooting in the Bronx of a suspected gang member, 28-year-old Oscar Belgal, while a 5-year-old boy believed to be his son sat in the back of his SUV.
Marcos Charles, ICE’s Executive Associate Director of Enforcement and Removal Operations (ERO), said Friday that Belgal was the target of an investigation, had evaded law enforcement before and refused to comply with federal immigration agents on Thursday.
Charles said Belgal had also been charged in New York with grand larceny, robbery, theft, and being armed with a deadly weapon.
As of April 2025, he was serving five years of probation for felony grand larceny.
ICE lodged a detainer request for Belgal based on the charges and his alleged involvement in the shooting of a US Customs and Border Protection (CBP) agent two years ago in Lincoln Heights, the ERO official noted.
“He’s known,” Charles said of Belgal. “The gang that he runs with is known for thefts using weapons and mopeds.”
“Yesterday, we attempted to arrest Mr. Belgal. In the attempt, we used our vehicles to block him in,” Charles continued. “Mr. Belgal refused lawful orders to exit his vehicle. He then accelerated his vehicle smashing into two of our government ICE vehicles and then weaponized his vehicle and proceeded to accelerate going towards other officers.”
“Our officers, using their training — and believing that their life and the life of the partners and the general public were in danger — used their training and fired weapons,” he recounted. “Mr. Belgal was struck by one of the bullets or fragments superficially in the neck. He stopped his vehicle. We arrested him, rendered first aid, and then took him to the hospital.”
“Because of Mr. Belgal’s lengthy criminal history and known fleeing, we placed him in a detention facility out of sight of the state of New York,” Charles also noted.
“We will continue to prosecute this individual to the fullest. We will continue to put him in place of and removal proceedings, and we will continue to try to remove him from this country as quickly as possible following his charges,” he added.
Law enforcement sources told The Post Friday morning that Belgal was in federal custody in New Jersey.
