President Trump is expected to criticize Gov. Kathy Hochul’s handling of immigration enforcement when he appears at a rally in Syracuse on Friday alongside Republican gubernatorial candidate Bruce Blakeman. The visit comes days after two violent incidents in New York City reignited debate over the state’s sanctuary policies.
Last week, two men living in the country illegally allegedly stabbed an off-duty NYPD detective in the Bronx during an attempted robbery. The suspects, 25-year-old D’Angelo Caraballo and 24-year-old Sneider Mejia Bautista, both Dominican nationals, were arrested early Wednesday after they were found hiding in a basement in Lynn, Massachusetts.
Caraballo had previously been arrested on charges including reckless driving, fleeing from police and criminal possession of a loaded firearm. He was released by local police following his December 2024 arrest. Bautista was arrested in October of last year on charges that included grand larceny, criminal possession of a weapon and stealing property, and was released after the NYPD declined to honor an ICE detainer request.
On Thursday afternoon, a separate incident unfolded when Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers shot and wounded Oscar Belgal, a 28-year-old suspected migrant gang member, in the Marble Hill section of the Bronx. A 5-year-old boy believed to be Belgal’s son was sitting in the back of his SUV at the time of the shooting.
The Department of Homeland Security said Belgal is suspected of ties to the Trinitarios gang and has “a prior criminal conviction for grand larceny, and multiple prior arrests for assault, robbery, possession of drugs, and weapons possession.” The department also said Belgal was arrested by the NYPD on December 7, 2023, but was released days later under what it called “reckless Democrat sanctuary policies.”
Hochul signed the Local Cops, Local Crimes Act in August, which limits certain forms of statewide cooperation with ICE on civil immigration matters. Following the Belgal shooting, she issued a statement saying, “New Yorkers are outraged tonight. Immigrant communities are terrified. And we are demanding answers.”
“Tonight, I spoke with President Trump and DHS Secretary Mullin about the shooting in Marble Hill. I expressed outrage on behalf of New Yorkers and urged them to halt ICE enforcement operations in New York. I also asked that any body camera footage of the shooting be released to the public so we can establish the facts and get to the truth.”
Blakeman, who trails in most polls in his challenge to Hochul, said earlier this week that he would sign an executive order requiring local law enforcement to cooperate with ICE if elected on November 3. “The insanity is over, we’re putting New Yorkers first,” he said, describing one of the hardest moments of his time as Nassau County executive as the day he had to tell police and sheriffs they could no longer cooperate with ICE because of Hochul’s policies.
Syracuse sits in Onondaga County, a Democratic-leaning area surrounded by a largely Republican region of central New York. Beyond boosting Blakeman’s campaign, Trump’s visit is also expected to benefit Republican House candidate Kailee Buller, a former USDA official running against first-term Democratic Rep. John Mannion.
Ahead of the rally, the Trump administration has pointed to several cases of people living in the country illegally who were arrested in Syracuse. Those cases include Hsa Mu Na, accused of sexual exploitation of a minor; Norberto Machado-Rodriguez, accused of sexual assault; Haikham Phimasone, accused of assault; and Said Ibrahim, accused of child cruelty.
