A DECIDEDLY DESPONDENT contingent of city and county elected officials gathered at city hall in Austin, Texas, on November 17 for a press conference designed to address residents’ “safety concerns” following the election of Donald Trump as the next president of the United States.
In particular, the officials — including the city’s mayor, several city council members, and the newly elected district attorney and sheriff — sought to quell the concerns of the city’s sizable immigrant population, given the nasty, xenophobic rhetoric espoused by Trump and his surrogates. “My message,” said council member Greg Casar, “to the people who fear, justifiably, in their hearts what is to come, is that before they come for you, they have to come through me.”
[...]
Although there is no legal definition of what a sanctuary city is, the term is colloquially bestowed on cities or counties that have policies limiting or refusing local law enforcement cooperation with federal immigration enforcement authorities.
In practice, that has generally meant refusing to cooperate with ICE detainer requests made under an Obama-era program called Secure Communities, or S-Comm, and its progeny, the newly named but largely unchanged Priority Enforcement Program.
The Intercept
Of which, Austin is now one with this year's election of Sheriff Sally Hernandez.
If ICE gets a hit on a person thought to be in the country illegally, it issues a detainer request to the local jail, asking that the city or county hold the individual — even beyond the person’s term of incarceration or after a person has made bail — until ICE can come to pick them up.
Under S-Comm, ICE regularly asked for detainers on immigrants regardless of how minor their alleged crime.
[...]
Participation in S-Comm, which Trump has vowed to re-up in its original form, was instrumental in securing the record-setting 2.5 million deportations carried out during the first six years of Obama’s tenure, leading some advocates to dub the president “Deporter in Chief.”
[...]
Indeed, it’s not only S-Comm that Trump wants to bring back to life, but he is also a fan of the 287(g) program, which he has called a “popular” program that he would like to “expand and revitalize.”
Under that strategy, local law enforcement officers are actually deputized by the federal agency, and instead of merely granting a detainer request are tasked with ferreting out the immigration status of those in their custody.
[...]
The misuse of the 287(g) is one of the legacies of the infamous and recently ousted sheriff of Maricopa County, Arizona, Joe Arpaio.
[...]
Not only are the programs abusive, but in the case of S-Comm, unconstitutional — according to a string of recent court cases in which judges have found that the unlawful detention of a person absent probable cause is a violation of the Fourth Amendment.
[...]
“I think we’re in for a real fight this year,” said Bob Libal, executive director of the activist group Grassroots Leadership. “If there’s anything this election shows us it’s that you can get elected by appealing to the worst in people when it comes to immigration — the worst.”
[...]
And good luck to Austin citizens who run afoul of the Trump administration. I'm concerned that the brave council member Greg Casar might not be large enough to block the path.
They're going to need the courts. Uh-oh.
...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.
