The mayor of New Jersey’s largest city on Friday accused Homeland Security’s deportation agency of a warrantless “raid” on a local business after officers questioned employees and arrested three suspected illegal immigrants.

Newark Mayor Ras Baraka said officers from U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement entered private areas of the business, Ocean Seafood Depot, and made even people who turned out to be citizens show their IDs.

The case has quickly gained national attention as the first flashpoint in President Trump’s plans for “mass” deportations. Mr. Trump has said he would focus first on illegal immigrants with criminal records, but the mayor said that wasn’t the case here.

“The problem with this is that none of these people were rapists or murderers or criminals,” the mayor said. “The problem with it is that ICE went in there without a warrant.”

The mayor said his information came from the business owner and local activists.

ICE didn’t address the warrant claims but did defend the way its officers handled the encounters at the business, saying they “may request identification to establish an individual’s identity.”

The Newark arrests were part of a torrid day of action by ICE.

In a social media post late Thursday the agency said it made 538 arrests and lodged 373 “detainer” requests asking state and local authorities to hold deportation targets for pickup by federal officers.

ICE said the Newark arrests were a worksite enforcement case.

The Biden administration curtailed worksite enforcement, saying it didn’t want to frighten rank-and-file illegal immigrants. It said it wanted to focus more on illegal immigrants with major felony convictions.

Biden officials also placed limits on the words ICE employees could use and had a lengthy list of no-go sanctuary zones where officers were forbidden from making arrests.

Mr. Trump’s team has wiped those restrictions away.

But Mr. Baraka, the Newark mayor, said officers still have to respect the Constitution, which forbids warrantless searches.

He said ICE was creating a “blanket of fear” in immigrant communities.

The Justice Department this week sent a memo to federal prosecutors prodding them to consider criminal charges against localities that thwart immigration enforcement.

“I’m not afraid of that,” Mr. Baraka said Friday. “If he thinks that we’re just going to go to jail quietly, he’s got another thing coming.”

He smiled.

“You’ve got to send the right people to Newark,” he said, adding, “We don’t want no problems.”

Fellow officials and activists who joined him at the press conference applauded his tough talk.

• Stephen Dinan can be reached at sdinan@washingtontimes.com.