New York is forming a team of legal observers to track and record the actions of federal immigration officers, Attorney General Letitia James announced. These monitors will wear purple vests and are drawn from a pool of volunteers within her office. Each has been trained to watch without getting in the way and to check if the Trump administration's enforcement tactics stay within the limits of the law.

This move follows weeks of unrest in Minneapolis, where Donald Trump sent thousands of armed, masked agents to find and deport migrants. The Department of Homeland Security responded by saying James is putting New Yorkers at risk by refusing to cooperate with Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). James, however, says her office will use the evidence gathered by these observers to decide whether to file future lawsuits against the federal government.