new Jersey freshman Congresswoman Lam Monica Maccgyver is in the crosshairs of the Trump administration facing assault charges for her role in a recent clash outside an immigration detention center in Newark where she and other members of Congress were attempting an oversight visit at the newly opened facility according to the criminal complaint Macyver slammed an ICE agent and tried to restrain him while officers were taking Newark Mayor Raz Baraka into custody maccgyver has maintained her innocence and dismissed the charges as political intimidation she spoke with senior political correspondent David Cruz for this week's episode of Chatbox take a listen well it was a very tense situation David i mean honestly it was unbelievable i could not imagine or could not even think I would ever be dealing with something like that uh as a elected official as a member of Congress but specifically just as a human being the way um that whole event unfolded um as mentioned m multiple times we were there to do our job i was there with my colleagues uh Congresswoman Bonnie Watson Coleman and Rob Mendez and ICE and Homeland Security created that situation out there they created uh everything that happened and transpired out there uh we were just simply there to do a oversight visit which is something that we've done before alto together um and it has never been that chaotic or that kind of confrontation and so it was just definitely um unbelievable and unnecessary um to see something like that unfold and so that brought out what anger I mean it definitely brought out I I would say definitely frustration i think it was a mix a mix of a mixture of emotions from uh being scared from being frightened to being you know upset about what was happening i mean it was just it was really truly an unbelievable episode uh that played out there and you know once again just there to do our jobs didn't think that something like that would happen but definitely I would say David a mixture of of emotions um and just fusion of why that was even taking place there's calls uh by Republicans in the House for sanctions uh against you what's your reaction to that well I think it's just political intimidation you know I I think that's mainly what it is what we're seeing play out um you know from censoring me to uh kicking me uh Bonnie and Rob off of our committees for showing up um at Delaney Hall to do our jobs um there was a a resolution basically uh introduced by one of my colleagues to have me expelled from Congress and so these are just political tactics uh that Republicans like to use to try to you know silence us or stop us from doing our jobs um as Democrats you know and as elected leaders and that's just not going to happen for me david I don't plan to stop doing my job these things are not going to scare me into not doing my job and so definitely going to continue to serve the people of the tent do you feel targeted i mean I do in some cases i think you know I'm not the first to be here in this space i think since January 20th we've seen a lot of this play out underneath this administration underneath the Trump administration from judges you know to universities to schools i think when you don't roll over and die for this administration or stop uh doing the job on behalf of the people uh they target you you know they try to make an example out of you um you know to do uh something other than what they want you to do and then once again that is just not going to happen um to this Nort girl you know I came to Congress people elected me to come here and do a job this is not my first rodeo or job in politics you know and so at the end of the day I have to work on behalf of the 744,000 people I represent so all of these tactics all of this intimidation me being targeted is not going to um hinder me for serving the people of the 10th whereabouts in Newark uh did you grow up you Southworn so I I grew up in the Central Ward david I see David I think you know that the Central Ward graduate of Central High School but definitely a Central Ward girl all the way through all right uh so all right all those charges pending and who knows what whim the president and the Justice Department are going to be acting on in a month so uh the larger question though is uh how the federal government is conducting itself defying protocols for members of supposedly co-equal branches of government ignoring judges uh trying to bypass basic civil rights like privacy uh you know denying illegal search and seizure uh protections and more is there any doubt uh that these efforts are going to intensify no I mean I think they are constantly ramping up i think that Trump has literally weaponized many departments including the DOJ uh to his liking to go after people that he disagrees with or doesn't like um I think from the our own US attorney acting attorney here in New Jersey she's made public comments about turning New Jersey red and you know uh working on behalf of Trump and you know doing all these making all these different comments um and I just think we're going to continue to see more of this [Music]