‘Will they be coming back?’ Sunday morning ICE raid sparks anxiety in Morristown’s Latino community

By Andrew Dutton

Shortly before 10:30 a.m. on Sunday, several witnesses along Speedwell Avenue near Henry Street reported seeing men in tactical gear jump out of black sport utility vehicles, apprehending “at least two people” who were standing on the brick steps outside Willmar’s Laundromat.

An attendant at the Sunoco gas station across the street, who asked not to be named, said: “I saw a young guy crossing the street, and ICE agents ran after him, and captured him. They put him in handcuffs and placed him inside a white vehicle.”

A few hours after the incident, Tatiana Arriaga of Morristown stood at the reception kiosk of the Bravo Barbershop, which looks directly across the street from the laundromat. She wondered aloud, “I wonder if they (ICE) will be coming back.”

Speedwell Place arrest, Jan. 11, 2026. Video by Justin Broadbent:

At businesses up and down Speedwell Avenue, clients, diners, and patrons of various businesses exchanged information and speculated about what had transpired. Earlier in the day, Mayor Tim Dougherty estimated between seven and 10 people were taken away by federal authorities.

Prepared to help ease anxiety and provide comfort to community members wary of ICE operations, Deacon Carlos Penagos of St. Margaret’s Roman Catholic Church on Speedwell Avenue walked up and down the sidewalk, offering moral support to anyone seeking counsel and fielding calls from concerned parishioners.

At one point, Deacon Carlos could be seen clutching his phone, gathering information from a man who claimed to be the brother of someone swept up by ICE earlier in the morning.

With Deacon Carlos’ cellphone on speaker, a man speaking in Spanish told Morristown Green that his brother, 17-year-old Morristown High School senior Juan Daniel Mendoza, had gone to the laundromat to do laundry when he was encountered by ICE.

The older brother indicated that after Juan failed to come home, he started calling his cellphone and became concerned when he did not answer.

Hearing that ICE had been conducting enforcement operations in the area, he went to the laundromat to look for Juan. That’s when he found out ICE had detained him.

“I’m looking for information about where he is, because he’s a minor,” the older brother said.

Across the street from the laundromat, Pan Casero Bakery & Kitchen owners Maria Muñoz and Fanny Malo taped a hastily constructed sign to the glass door of their shop.

“If you are from ICE or police, and you don’t have a search warrant, you can not enter here,” the sign read.

“I’m putting it up…because (law enforcement) is not allowed to enter our stores if we have those signs, and we are doing it in order to protect our customers,” Muñoz said.

Several eyewitnesses to the sweep noted they saw no assistance from, or coordination with, Morristown police. The town adheres to a state attorney general directive barring cooperation with federal immigration enforcement

One witness, who also asked not to be named, was careful to draw a distinction between ICE and the local police. “I saw ICE arresting a woman with a kid, which is not fair…they’re trying to make everybody afraid. (But the local) police in Morristown, they are really nice. They like people like us. They like our community.”

Further down Speedwell Avenue towards the center of Morristown, parishioners and other curious people gathered in the parking lot of St. Margaret’s. At the edge of the lot sat a Morristown Police Department vehicle, about the size of a city bus, quietly maintaining watch over the area.

Circulating among a small crowd, Father Duberney Villamizar, pastor of St. Margaret’s, remarked, “We are here to show our support to the people; saying to the people that they are not alone, and that the church is with them.”

Latino community reacts to Morristown raid, Jan. 11, 2026. Video by Andrew Dutton for Morristown Green:

PUSH FOR THREE IMMIGRANT-PROTECTION BILLS

Advocates say Sunday’s ICE sweep underscores the urgency of three immigrant-protection bills now awaiting action from Gov. Phil Murphy, who leaves office next week.

Adam McGovern, a volunteer with the Wind of the Spirit Immigrant Resource Center in Madison, said the nonprofit is urging Murphy to sign the measures before he steps down.

They are:

• The Safe Communities Act (A6308 / S5036), which would establish model policies to protect so-called “sensitive locations” from ICE enforcement, including schools, clinics, food pantries, funeral homes and houses of worship.

• The Privacy Protection Act (A6309 / S5037), which would create a firewall limiting how state and local agencies collect and share private data — including Motor Vehicle Commission records and automatic license-plate-reader data — that can be used by ICE to track people.

• Codification of the Immigrant Trust Directive (A6310 / S5038), which would turn New Jersey’s existing policy limiting cooperation between local police and federal immigration agents into permanent law, while tightening those limits further.

Murphy issued the Immigrant Trust Directive early in his administration, a policy that has governed New Jersey law enforcement for seven years.

“We don’t know if Murphy is going to sign; we are in a concerted push to make sure he does,” McGovern said. “He did the right thing by initiating the Immigrant Trust Directive; he can cement that legacy by signing these bills which build on his vision. Our communities need it more every day, and this can be the day he helps us start to turn it around.”

McGovern said the stakes are high if Murphy declines to act.

“If Murphy doesn’t sign them, the whole process would have to start over, and that is time we don’t have,” he said.

Supporters of the bills argue that states have the constitutional authority to set limits on how their own agencies interact with federal immigration authorities.

McGovern said similar laws in Illinois, Cook County and Chicago recently were upheld by a federal judge under the Tenth Amendment, which bars the federal government from forcing state and local governments to carry out federal functions.

He also pointed to Hoboken, which adopted its own local trust law after being sued by the Trump administration over its sanctuary policies.

“The bottom line is that you stand up to bullies and it scares them off,” McGovern said. “If we bow to him now we’ll be in worse shape than before.”

Kevin Coughlin contributed to this report.