Homeland Security officials made false statements in a bid to justify expelling New York residents from programs that allow U.S. travelers to quickly traverse borders and airport lines, federal government attorneys admitted Thursday. .
The surprise admission, contained in a court filing, said the inaccuracies “undermine a central argument” in the Trump administration’s case for banning New Yorkers from the programs after the state passed a law allowing undocumented immigrants to obtain driver’s licenses.
Federal officials had insisted that New York was an outlier by imposing restrictions on immigration authorities so that they did not have access to state Department of Motor Vehicle records. For that reason, they argued, New York was jeopardizing national security and it could not be trusted to participate in Global Entry and related travel programs.
But in their presentation Thursday, government attorneys acknowledged that several other states, Washington, DC, and some US territories also restricted access to information about motor vehicles and had not been subject to such a ban.
In that context, the presentation said: “The Acting Secretary of Homeland Security has decided to restore New York residents’ access to the Trusted Traveler Programs, with immediate effect.”
The filing came in response to lawsuits filed by New York State and the New York Civil Liberties Union over the decision to exclude New Yorkers from the program.
“The defendants deeply regret the previous inaccurate or misleading statements and apologize to the court and the plaintiffs for the need to make these corrections at this late stage of the litigation,” said Audrey Strauss, the United States Acting Prosecutor in Manhattan. .
The court filing offered an explanation for the unexpected Department of Homeland Security announcement Thursday that it was allowing New Yorkers to return to what is officially known as the Trusted Traveler Program.
The announcement came nearly six months after the department banned residents of the state from Global Entry and other programs because of the state’s approval of the so-called green light law.
Unlike their counterparts in other states, New York law restricted immigration authorities from accessing state Department of Motor Vehicle records without a court order.
When the government moved to block state residents from travel programs due to the driver’s license law, Governor Andrew M. Cuomo condemned the action as “a form of extortion.”
The dispute escalated over the course of a week, until Cuomo met with President Trump at the White House in February in hopes of reaching a deal.
The agreement reached, which was enshrined in a state budget bill in April, gives federal authorities access to the motor vehicle records of those applying for trusted traveler status.
Cuomo and federal officials said Thursday that it was the compromise that paved the way for the announcement that New Yorkers were allowed to re-enroll in travel programs.
“I am glad that this problem has finally been resolved for all New Yorkers,” the governor said in a statement.
In his own statement, Chad F. Wolf, acting secretary of Homeland Security, said that “we appreciate the sharing of information” that allowed the department “to move forward and once again begin prosecuting New York residents” in the Trusted Traveler Programs. .
Neither of them mentioned the court filing and the admissions it contained.
Benjamin Weiser contributed reporting.
