Federal immigration officers have launched a major enforcement operation in New York City, beginning in Queens on Monday and expanding across other parts of the metropolitan area on Tuesday, according to sources who spoke with NewsNation.

The move marks a significant escalation in immigration enforcement in one of the nation’s most prominent sanctuary friendly strongholds, where local leaders have spent years making life harder for federal officers and easier for illegal aliens.

The operation comes more than a month after White House border czar Tom Homan warned that more immigration enforcement resources were headed to New York City.

Last week, Homan said ICE would be increasing its presence after an alleged attack on a federal building.

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Homan made clear that the operation was already in the works before that incident, but he argued the attack showed the rising hostility aimed at federal immigration officers.

That hostility has not appeared out of thin air, despite what the professional excuse makers on the left would like voters to believe.

“There’s just another example of someone attacking ICE because of the constant mismessaging and vilification of the men and women of ICE,” Homan told reporters last week.

According to NewsNation, the operation is being handled by federal officers already assigned to the New York field office.

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Sources said ICE has not yet brought in agents from other locations, meaning this is not some mystery invasion cooked up in a fever dream on cable news.

The enforcement push is reportedly focused on illegal aliens and other noncitizens who were released after local jails and prisons refused to honor ICE detainers.

In plain English, federal immigration authorities asked for these individuals to be held for transfer, and local officials let them walk back into the community instead.

That is the sanctuary city shell game in action. Local politicians posture about compassion, then regular citizens are left to deal with the consequences when dangerous policies collide with reality.

New York’s Protect Our Courts Act generally blocks ICE from making civil immigration arrests while people are traveling to, attending, or leaving state courthouses.

The law has become another barrier in a growing maze of restrictions that make federal immigration enforcement more difficult in a city already drowning in migrant related chaos.

Even with those restrictions, sources told NewsNation that the operation could lead to collateral arrests.

That means officers may detain people who were not the original targets if they are encountered during the operation and are found to be in the country illegally.

Homan has repeatedly said that anyone in the United States illegally remains subject to immigration enforcement, even if that person was not initially listed as a target by the Department of Homeland Security.

That is not radical.

That is called enforcing the law, a concept that seems to baffle more than a few blue city officials.

For weeks, Homan has indicated that ICE would expand operations in New York City, though he declined to provide a specific timeline.

He has also sharply criticized New York leaders after Gov. Kathy Hochul signed legislation limiting cooperation between state and local law enforcement and federal immigration authorities inside local jails.

Hochul signed that legislation at the end of May, further cementing the state’s resistance to federal immigration enforcement.

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A Department of Homeland Security spokesperson declined to confirm whether Monday’s operation had started, citing operational security.

The spokesperson did offer a broader statement about the agency’s mission.

“ICE agents uphold our nation’s immigration laws in all 50 states, seven days a week, 24 hours a day,” the spokesperson said.

That message will not sit well with the sanctuary crowd, but it is exactly what many Americans have been demanding.

After years of open border madness, catch and release politics, and local governments thumbing their noses at federal detainers, voters are watching to see whether Washington is finally serious.

New York officials can keep pretending that obstruction is virtue, but ICE appears to be moving forward anyway.

If local leaders will not help enforce immigration law, federal officers are making clear they are prepared to do the job themselves.

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