The city released audit findings from six agencies after Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s Executive Order 13, documenting how federal immigration authorities are operating in New York and proposing steps to tighten city protections for immigrants. The audits paint a picture of aggressive federal tactics, a spike in detainer requests, and specific incidents where agents used deceptive approaches at shelters and city facilities. This piece walks through the key discoveries, the pushback from City Hall, and the federal response recorded in the report.
Executive Order 13 required a focused public safety audit of six agencies that interact directly with vulnerable New Yorkers: the Administration for Children’s Services, the New York Police Department, the Departments of Correction, Probation, Health and Mental Hygiene, and Social Services. The order was one of Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s first moves in office and was framed as part of his promise to protect immigrant communities that rely on city services. The audits and a 19-page executive summary map where policies meet practice and where officials believe the city is exposed.
The audits detail numerous encounters between municipal staff and federal immigration authorities, and they offer recommendations intended to close loopholes and cover blind spots in city sanctuary policies. “The findings and recommendations released today will strengthen City agencies’ protocols when interacting with federal authorities and ensure that all New Yorkers, regardless of immigration status, can safely access the City services they deserve,” said Faiza Ali, commissioner of the Mayor’s Office of Immigrant Affairs. City officials argue those tightened protocols are necessary because federal tactics are evolving and, in their view, becoming more intrusive.
One of the most striking figures in the report is the jump in detainer requests sent to city agencies. The NYPD received 3,672 requests for civil immigration detainers in 2025, a dramatic leap from 99 requests the year before, according to the audit’s account. Despite that surge, the NYPD did not hand anyone over to federal immigration custody in response to those detainer requests, which the city presented as evidence that local policies were holding.
The audit includes scene-level details that Republican critics will point to as proof of federal overreach, while city leaders frame them as examples of law enforcement tactics that ignore municipal boundaries. In June 2025, personnel affiliated with the Department of Homeland Security visited a shelter and initially identified themselves as Fire Department officials, according to the report; they only admitted they were with DHS after a city employee demanded identification. Incidents like this are central to the city’s argument that federal agents have used misleading approaches when trying to access shelters.
April 2025 saw multiple visits to shelters by officers from several federal agencies, including U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, DHS, the FBI, and the DEA, and the audits describe as many as ten such visits in a short span. Agents sometimes arrived in plainclothes and used pretexts like “wellness checks” to ask about specific clients, and they presented subpoenas or administrative warrants in some cases. The report stresses that administrative warrants and subpoenas do not automatically authorize entry into shelters, though it notes that legally binding judicial warrants were presented on two occasions, leading to one arrest.
Another episode recorded in the audits involved ICE agents entering a Department of Probation building in Brooklyn; the report recounts that they asked to use the bathroom but then attempted to consult the facility’s sign-in book. Staff intercepted the agents, checked identification, and escorted them out, the summary says, treating the episode as another example of federal personnel pushing boundaries in city-run spaces. These operational accounts are used in the report to recommend clearer routines for verifying credentials and denying access when necessary.
Mamdani and his administration have positioned the audits as a defensive measure meant to preserve local discretion. Mamdani has been a vocal opponent of ICE and the Trump administration’s immigration agenda. “I am proud to share key findings and recommendations from the audit that will ensure that we are responding to the changing nature of federal immigration enforcement and protecting the rights of all New Yorkers, regardless of immigration status,” he said, framing the review as both policy and political posture.
The White House response pushed back in unmistakable terms. The White House urged “ICE officers act heroically to enforce the law and protect American communities — local officials should work with them, not against them. Anyone doing otherwise is simply doing the bidding of criminal illegal aliens. The Trump Administration will not waver on enforcing federal immigration law.” The audit concludes with a set of recommendations aimed at tightening protocols, closing identified loopholes, and strengthening protections so that city agencies can shield immigrant residents while navigating federal enforcement actions.
