Blakeman backs down: Nassau will comply with the 287(g) ban, but he is joining the sheriffs' suit

On Aug. 26 at a news conference, Bruce Blakeman said Nassau County will yield to the Local Cops, Local Crimes Act provision dissolving its 287(g) agreement with ICE — ending the standoff in which Nassau was the last undecided holdout past the Aug. 25 deadline. He said he will still instruct county police to cooperate with ICE "whenever possible," and that he will join the federal suit filed by 15 sheriffs (Bourgault v. Hochul, N.D.N.Y.) challenging the law. Blakeman: "This law is written in the blood of victims past, present and future... I am a law-and-order county executive. I believe in the rule of law, even when it's a bad law." He also said that going forward "every murder, every rape, every robbery, every burglary, every drug overdose committed by an illegal migrant is on the hands of Kathy Hochul and the Democrats." Hochul, speaking at the State Fair, said: "We have made dramatic progress. We didn't need any 287(g) agreements... I want local police using local taxpayer dollars to focus on catching local criminals." Reporting context in the same piece: 13 jurisdictions had formal agreements when the ban was enacted in May; Nassau has held more than 1,000 people at its East Meadow jail for ICE since October 2025, the most of any New York county; and Newsday reported that between February 2025 and March 2026, 147 immigrants detained at the Nassau jail had prior violent-crime convictions — under 5% of those arrested. A Hochul spokesperson did not immediately comment on Blakeman's announcement.