Republicans don’t need you to know the way sanctuary cities work. The time period itself is a bit deceptive — there isn’t a one-size-fits-all definition, since sanctuary insurance policies fluctuate from metropolis to metropolis. Republicans additionally don’t need you to know the way lengthy the sanctuary motion has been round — way back to 1971, when Berkeley, California, declared itself a secure haven for troopers resisting the Vietnam Warfare. However take heed to the GOP’s favored speaking factors, and also you’ll stroll away with the misunderstanding that sanctuary cities are a current fad, hatched by “radical left” mayors to gasoline chaos and violent crime.
Proper-wing politicians, in fact, have a vested curiosity in stoking anti-immigrant panic to attain political factors. These lies had been on the forefront of a six hour-long Home Oversight Committee listening to on Wednesday, throughout which Republicans grilled the Democratic mayors of 4 cities on their immigration insurance policies.
Mayors Michelle Wu of Boston, Mike Johnston of Denver and Brandon Johnson of Chicago every mounted a forceful protection of metropolis legal guidelines limiting cooperation between native authorities and federal immigration enforcement. Even Eric Adams, New York’s disgraced and indicted mayor, acknowledged, weakly, that immigrants “play an important function within the functioning of the town” and famous that, underneath New York Metropolis legislation, each “law-abiding resident, documented or not” has a proper “to entry important providers with out concern of being turned over to federal authorities.”
Regardless of governing a significant metropolis with sanctuary insurance policies, Adams has up to now chosen to chorus from talking out in opposition to Donald Trump’s immigration orders, opting as an alternative to hatch a self-serving deal with the present administration. Adams has ordered his workers to not criticize Trump, and he’s directed migrant shelter operators to let in immigration officers with no warrant in the event that they “fairly really feel threatened.” Because of that bootlicking, the Division of Justice (DOJ) intervened in Adams’s federal corruption probe final month and requested the court docket to dismiss the case. Adams’s current makes an attempt to curry favor with the president additionally yielded him a lighter line of Republican questioning at Wednesday’s listening to than the opposite three mayors.
Nonetheless, all through the day, GOP lawmakers tried to color sanctuary cities as illegal, and a number of other went as far as to recommend that each one 4 mayors might face prison prosecution.
“Each one in all you is uncovered to prison culpability right here,” stated Rep. Andy Biggs (R-Arizona), who additionally held up indicators reading “sanctuary cities are unlawful.” Rep. Anna Paulina Luna (R-Florida), a fervent MAGA loyalist, outrageously claimed that she is going to refer the mayors to the DOJ) for prosecution. Trump’s administration has already made similar threats, and in February, the DOJ filed a lawsuit in opposition to Johnson and different Illinois officers, alleging that Chicago’s sanctuary insurance policies are obstructing the federal authorities’s immigration actions.
Republicans would really like you to suppose that native officers are breaking with some long-held precedent by upholding sanctuary insurance policies. However a have a look at historical past rapidly invalidates their key speaking factors. Chicago was first declared a sanctuary metropolis again in 1985, when Mayor Harold Washington signed an government order prohibiting metropolis workers from sharing details about immigration standing with federal authorities. Republicans have had 40 years to show that coverage is prohibited. They haven’t.
The truth is, time and time once more, courts have reaffirmed the legality of sanctuary insurance policies. The Supreme Court docket says that immigration is the sole accountability of the federal authorities, and federal legislation doesn’t require native governments to gather data on immigration standing. In 2018, Trump’s administration sued to dam the California Values Act, which prohibits metropolis workers and police from asking about an individual’s immigration standing, detaining a person at federal officers’ request, or collaborating in arrests on civil immigration warrants. The Ninth Circuit Court docket of Appeals ruled in California’s favor in 2019, and the Supreme Court docket declined to take up the case.
Different makes an attempt by the Trump administration to curtail native sanctuary insurance policies have additionally failed. Throughout his first time period, Trump signed an government order limiting federal funding to sanctuary cities, one thing his administration has once again threatened to do. However this tactic, too, has failed within the courts. A 2018 ruling by the Ninth Circuit was clear: The president can solely withhold federal funding with congressional authorization. Whereas the Trump administration appealed that call, the Supreme Court docket as soon as once more dismissed the case in 2021.
Whereas Republicans declare that sanctuary cities harbor violent criminals, a number of research have proven that, on common, fewer crimes are dedicated per capita in counties with sanctuary insurance policies. Native officers do collaborate with federal immigration when there’s a prison warrant, and native legal guidelines in opposition to violent crime in fact nonetheless apply no matter one’s immigration standing. Different research present that poverty and unemployment charges are decrease in sanctuary cities, and advocates word that what the insurance policies truly do is allow undocumented individuals to hunt providers like authorized support, housing and training, with out fearing deportation.
Regardless of the clear weaknesses in Republicans’ arguments, Democratic lawmakers have usually opted to entertain right-wing, anti-immigrant myths as an alternative of happening the document in defense of human rights. Throughout the 2024 presidential election, the Democratic Occasion’s official platform lurched onerous to the suitable on immigration, a part of an ill-fated bid to win over undecided voters after polling discovered voters most popular how Republicans approached the border. So, it was encouraging to listen to Johnson, Wu and Johnston use the Home ground to make compelling arguments in favor of sanctuary cities.
“If you happen to needed to make us secure, go gun reforms,” Wu rebutted through the listening to. “Cease reducing Medicaid. Cease reducing most cancers analysis. Cease reducing funds for veterans. That’s what will make our cities secure.”
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