Albany, N.Y. — A massive immigration raid of a Cato protein bar factory that was billed as a major criminal investigation so far has netted no arrests for violent crimes.
Acting U.S. Attorney John Sarcone III said today that the only arrests in the Sept. 4 immigration raid were five people charged with illegally reentering the country after they had already been deported, a felony.
“The bad old days of turning a blind eye are over. We recognize the contributions of lawful immigrants,” Sarcone said. “But illegal reentry after deportation is a flagrant violation of federal law, and it will not be tolerated, nor will we tolerate the greed of those employers that knowingly hire illegals.”
On Thursday, officers from Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Border Patrol raided the Nutrition Bar Confectioners plant in Cato. Masked men yelled at people and rounded up everyone who appeared to Latino, according to workers, the owner and videos from the raid.
Sarcone said 57 workers were detained. Many of them have already been deported to Guatemala. Sarcone said the workers who were deported without hearings had waived their rights. Family members who have spoken to deported workers already in Guatemala said this is not true.
Sarcone would not answer questions about what caused authorities to look into the site in the first place.
The raid has shattered families in and around Fulton. Several children lost at least one parent, some lost both, families and advocates said. It was the first day of school in Fulton, and school officials said they were given no advance notice and had to scramble to find people who could care for the children.
Sarcone today said that Homeland Security coordinated with the schools and social services, but school officials previously said this was not true.
Fulton Superintendent Lawrence Douglas said the district found out about the raid from a parent working at the plant who called a teacher from the raid.
Sarcone said the investigation into the company would be continuing, and would include looking into whether the company provided “benefits, sick time, and all the usual things that employers do.”
The company’s owners said they provide benefits and sick time.
Sarcone was asked if he thought the people arrested in the raid were what Donald Trump meant when he said he was going after the “worst of the worst”.
“I have to do my job. I can’t turn my back and say, ‘I’m sorry. President Trump wanted to go after the worst of the worst,’” Sarcone said.
More than once, Sarcone said that by hiring workers who had entered the country illegally, the factory was taking jobs away from people who wanted them in a county with high unemployment.
“We owe it to the citizens that reside in the Northern District of New York, which has relatively high unemployment rates. We owe it to their families. We owe it to the veterans that have served this country, the taxpayers,” Sarcone said.
Unemployment in Cayuga County, where the plant is located, is about 3.7%. That’s historically low unemployment for the region and lower than the national average. An unemployment rate of 5% is considered full-employment.
Mike Schmidt, one of the company’s owners, said Latino workers began coming to him during Covid. They wanted work and he needed workers. Since then, more workers have come to the factory, finding jobs there through word of mouth.
He, his brothers and his wife know their families and their children. They are devastated by what has happened, he said.
“These are hard working people who … are embedded within their communities, our local communities, in their churches,” said Corinne Price, Lenny Schmidt’s wife who is also involved in the company. “And they are people that we love and we care about. They are not hardened criminals.”
Schmidt said the company requires every potential employee to go through the same verification process. He said they were not contacted by anyone from ICE or the Internal Revenue Service about any problems with their workers, either recently or in the past. He said they are baffled by what is going on.
The IRS, which participated in the raid, was not at Sarcone’s press conference Tuesday.
Trump appointed Sarcone the U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of New York at the beginning of this year.
Sarcone had never worked as a prosecutor before taking over the office. He previously worked as a lawyer on Trump’s presidential campaigns. Federal judges attempted to remove him earlier this year, but Attorney General Pam Bondi maneuvered to keep him in the office.
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