Sanctuary cities are in the news this week. The working definition is a city, county, or state that limits the amount of cooperation their local police force has with federal immigration officers. To the point, local police do not hold people for Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) when their only crime is being illegal immigrants. This article gives a good overview of the situation.
Texas Gov. Greg Abbott threatened to cut funding for one county after its sheriff announced the agency would be scaling back its cooperation with federal immigration.
Travis County Sheriff Sally Hernandez announced last week she's scaling back the amount of aid her department provides federal immigration agents in detaining suspects who might be in the country illegally, according to the Austin American-Statesman.
Starting Feb. 1, sheriff's officials will begin honoring so-called immigration holds or "detainers" placed by federal authorities only when a suspect is booked into the Travis County Jail on charges of capital murder, aggravated sexual assault and "continuous smuggling of persons."
Otherwise, federal agents must have a court order or arrest warrant signed by a judge for the jail to continue housing a person whose immigration status is in question.
On Wednesday, Jan 25, President Trump issued an executive order stating that sanctuary jurisdictions would not be eligible for federal funds.
[Continues...]
City officials, from New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, New Haven, Syracuse and Austin, Tex., said they were prepared for a protracted fight.
"We're going to defend all of our people regardless of where they come from, regardless of their immigration status," Mayor Bill de Blasio of New York said at a news conference with other city officials.
In Chicago, Mayor Rahm Emanuel declared: "I want to be clear: We're going to stay a sanctuary city. There is no stranger among us. Whether you're from Poland or Pakistan, whether you're from Ireland or India or Israel and whether you're from Mexico or Moldova, where my grandfather came from, you are welcome in Chicago as you pursue the American dream."
[...] "The rhetoric doesn't match the legal authority," said Peter L. Markowitz, the director of the Immigration Justice Clinic at the Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law in New York. "In fact, the president has very limited power to exercise any kind of significant defunding."
According to a 2012 Supreme Court decision, Mr. Markowitz said, Congress is not permitted to set conditions on spending to coerce states or localities to participate in a federal program against their will. Any conditions, at a minimum, must be directly related to the punitive action.
As of time of editing, 12:30AM EDT, this is the newest article on the topic:
President Trump is hailing the first victory in his fight against "sanctuary cities" after a South Florida mayor ordered his employees on Thursday to begin working more closely with federal immigration authorities.
For years, Miami-Dade County has refused to hold some undocumented immigrants in its jails for federal immigration agents. But after Trump signed an executive order threatening to withhold federal funding from sanctuary cities, Miami-Dade County Mayor Carlos Gimenez changed his mind.
Gimenez signed an executive order Thursday ordering the director of his corrections department to begin honoring all requests by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to hold immigration suspects in Miami-Dade County jails.
[...] Gimenez said he made the decision to ensure that the county does not lose out on $355 million in federal funding it has coming in 2017.
-- submitted from IRC
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 27 2017, @03:23PM
Gimenez is a republican, at least according to his entry on wikipedia as of last night.
So its not that big of a surprise he would capitulate to president fugazi.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by donkeyhotay on Friday January 27 2017, @03:30PM
I wonder if progressives are starting to see the value of having a smaller federal government, and in granting more autonomy to states, counties and cities.
(Score: 3, Touché) by LoRdTAW on Friday January 27 2017, @03:33PM
I wonder if anyone sees the value.
(Score: 2, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 27 2017, @03:42PM
What 45 is doing is unconstitutional.
He's tying unrelated funding to performance requirements.
The SCOTUS just ruled on the same question like 2 years ago - they struck down the mandatory medicaid expansion part of obamacare that worked exactly the same way.
The big cities will pool their resources, fight it out in the courts and 45 will lose.
This mayor only capitulated because miami cubans are his base and they have never had to worry about this problem - the wet-foot/dry-foot policy meant that there was no such thing as an undocumented cuban immigrant. If they made it to shore, they are officially documented immigrants.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 27 2017, @05:49PM
You keep calling him 45. Here, let me say it for you: PRESIDENT TRUMP. Now go hide in your safe space.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 27 2017, @05:53PM
Triggered
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday January 28 2017, @01:14AM
President RUMP.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 27 2017, @03:50PM
Libertarians have always warned of the future danger posed by collecting ever more power into a centralized government (especially a national government). Enjoy.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by number6x on Friday January 27 2017, @04:35PM
How dare these local politicians expect the federal government to produce a warrant or a court order, when the federal government demands that the local government keep a person (citizen or otherwise) in jail.
The next thing you know they'll be demanding due process, the rights of free speech and practice of religion, protection from unreasonable search and seizure, the right to bear arms and who knows what else.
Just trust the federal government, if they say so it must be for your own good.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 27 2017, @06:21PM
The jail shouldn't hold anybody for the federal government, but they should always notify the federal government prior to releasing anybody. If the federal government has reason to arrest somebody, they can show up at the exit and wait. The jail says "you're free, there is the exit" and the person walks out to where the federal agents are waiting. The federal agents say "you're under arrest" and put a fresh new pair of handcuffs on the person.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by bob_super on Friday January 27 2017, @06:35PM
I'm perfectly fine with the cities demanding that the feds use due process.
I'm also perfectly fine with the cities telling the feds when they have charged someone of questionable immigration status, or even when arrested for a serious offense.
If the cities don't want to hold "locally innocent" people in jail for warrantless feds, I'm fine with it too, as long as they collaborate afterwards with the feds when they do provide the warrants.
"We're going to defend all of our people (...), regardless of their immigration status" sounds really wrong to me.
Don't spend time and money to deal with them? Maybe. But "defend" do means that you're actively using your resources to protect someone who is breaking the rules.
If you don't like the immigration rules, campaign to get them changed.
You don't want to end up with the burden of citizen children in foster care after their parents get shipped out, that's nice and smart. Change the rules, so that the situation doesn't happen when people get caught after breaking them.
The immigration process is an unfair, complicated and burdensome bitch, I sure know. Many people get in trouble just by being the kids of people who decided to bypass the nasty system. Change the rules to accommodate the innocent, rather than claim that you should protect everyone.
Be rational. It sounds silly under the New Order. But even zealots have to settle for a practical rational solution every now and then.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 27 2017, @11:36PM
You can't change the rules if you are disenfranchised.
Deportation is a cruel and unusual punishment. Don't let anyone do that to anybody, legal or not.
(Score: 2) by bob_super on Friday January 27 2017, @11:49PM
I'm talking about local elected people ganging up to change the rules.
> Deportation is a cruel and unusual punishment.
Cruel depends on the conditions. "Single guy who snuck in last week to get a better pay than in democratic Chile" isn't the same thing as "kid who was 1 when his parents fled dictator X, but didn't apply for asylum because US supported the coup".
In neither case is it unusual, anyway.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday January 28 2017, @03:18AM
Ah. The siren's song of the "progressive." How would you feel if someone sneaked into your home, started squatting and then expected you to feed them and pay their medical expenses? Maybe they even worked and supported themselves. Would you still let them stay or would you think showing them the door was no longer cruel and unusual punishment?
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 27 2017, @08:47PM
Libertarians have always ignored the danger that having corporations collecting all that information represented.
Libertarianism is a disease of the mind primarily characterized by a complete inability to accurately predict the consequences of actions. The government shouldn't have all the power, so clearly that means it's OK for corporate interests to have all of it.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 27 2017, @09:05PM
I don't know what liars have been calling themselves libertarians in your hearing, but libertarians in general are pretty big, not only on governments interfering with people, but people interfering with each other.
Someone somewhere didn't read the fine print, bolted upright and screeched: "LIBERTARIANS WANT TO SELL OUR PRECIOUS BODILY FLUIDS TO CORPOROFASCIST VAMPIRES!!!" and unfortunately that drooling caricature took hold in the minds of people too busy or foolish to research these things.
Oh well, it'll sort itself out in a few decades.
Of course, for you to work this out, you'd have to understand different flavours of libertarians, how they reach their conclusions, understand the differences between minarchists, anarchocapitalists, contractarians and various others. Hard work, I know.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 27 2017, @11:44PM
Libertarianism: the true Scotsman of the political world.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday January 28 2017, @12:01AM
Only sometimes.
When it's anyone aligned with the major parties, they're always the untrue scotsman. Don't vote for them! They're evil! They will allow you to have abortions, do drugs and sell your aborted babies to megacorps!
Vote libertarian for a cyberpunk dystopia!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday January 28 2017, @02:58PM
(Score: 2) by Justin Case on Saturday January 28 2017, @01:37PM
Try to keep in mind that corporations get their permission to exist from government, not from Libertarians.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by kurenai.tsubasa on Friday January 27 2017, @04:11PM
Sounds good all around to me. I've noticed that there are a number of places where cannabis is de-facto decriminalized as well. I see a similarity there.
- Do the right thing and scale back enforcement for victimless “crimes” locally.
- Reduce expenses jailing people who aren't hurting others.
- Lose federal funding, but what do you need all that funding for now? Property taxes will suffice.
- Why do we have an income tax anyway that gives the feds all this juicy funding to trickle down from big government's golden shower? Why not just keep the tax money locally collected and locally spent?
- With local taxation and local spending, this gives jurisdictions even more autonomy to be sanctuary cities if they choose or to de-facto decriminalize cannabis if they choose.
True, I can see some argument where illegal immigration isn't victimless, but remember we've got free markets right? Plus, employers are only supposed to be hiring citizens, right? Where's the enforcement for that piece of the puzzle?
(Disclaimer: not an ancap here, just a bleeding-heart libertarian.)
(Score: 1, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 27 2017, @04:34PM
Lose federal funding, but what do you need all that funding for now? Property taxes will suffice.
It doesn't buy the wannabe commandos in the police force enough armored vehicles and other things that they really have no business having access to.
(Score: 2) by Grishnakh on Friday January 27 2017, @06:07PM
The problem is that you can't just keep the income tax money. Income tax is paid by individuals directly to the IRS (or rather, withheld by employers and sent directly to the IRS). Interrupting that relationship would probably end up involving troops being used to occupy any cities/states that prevented tax payments to the IRS.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 27 2017, @06:24PM
no, people just need to stop funding the scum in washington. only cowards, traitors and/or idiots pay the income tax. what does the income tax pay for? depleted uranium for the middle east? selling baby body parts? stealing land all over the country? turning the world into a surveillance state owned and controlled by international criminals, etc...if you think it's patriotic to pay the income tax you're a damned idiot. If you're an employer who collects taxes for the IRS, you're a complicit traitor.
(Score: 2) by tangomargarine on Friday January 27 2017, @08:02PM
only cowards, traitors and/or idiots pay the income tax.
if you think it's patriotic to pay the income tax you're a damned idiot
If the only argument you have in favor of something is patriotism and testosterone, you're the idiot.
"Is that really true?" "I just spent the last hour telling you to think for yourself! Didn't you hear anything I said?"
(Score: 2) by LoRdTAW on Sunday January 29 2017, @04:56PM
I'm pretty sure he has no testosterone and is compensating.
(Score: 1) by kurenai.tsubasa on Friday January 27 2017, @06:30PM
That's likely exactly what would happen without a 16th Amendment repeal. I just meant to bemoan how having all that tax money sent directly to the federal level allows them to have a bigger say in local affairs than they probably should.
I wonder what a breakdown would look like compared to the current funding model if we took away the 16th Amendment and have property taxes go up. People take home more since they're not paying the IRS, but then they pay more for housing. The funding has to come from somewhere, but it seems like it would be good to eliminate the slingshot around the feds. Would that funding level be comparable? What would the disparity between wealthy and poor jurisdictions look like compared to the status quo?
True, I'm not expecting the 16th Amendment to go anywhere anytime soon.
(Score: 2) by Grishnakh on Friday January 27 2017, @07:08PM
You don't need more property taxes to make up for it; states are free to have their own income taxes, and in fact most of them do. Sure, most of them are little more than "how much did you send the IRS this year? Ok, send us this fraction", but that's by choice. States can also raise more money with sales taxes. Property taxes are the least likely, because right now those are generally local-only, not levied by the state, whereas income and sales taxes are usually levied by the state (though sometimes with additions by localities).
(Score: 3, Interesting) by fritsd on Friday January 27 2017, @11:15PM
What you're describing sounds like the "principle of subsidiarity": bottom-up government construction [wikipedia.org].
It's "a thing" in the European Union and in Catholic social teaching.
It's also a bit like how taxes are spent in Sweden, if I remember it correctly [wikipedia.org]:
I thought that of the enormous taxes, the first chunk of government income goes to the taxpayer's Kommun's budget (town, say), the next chunk goes to the Län (province) budget (pays for the province's hospitals), and if you earn enough, you pay into the country's national budget (e.g. ministry of defense).
Most of the money probably goes to unemployment benefits and pensions, so that most of average people's taxes are spent on (other) people within ca. 50 km radius. The appeal to solidarity is therefore small :-) to optimise for citizens with a puny Monkeysphere [wikipedia.org] ("I'm not going to pay bloody tax for some foreigner who lives in the next province 100 km away!")
I could have remembered it wrong, though.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by meustrus on Friday January 27 2017, @05:46PM
Throughout all of American history the States Rights mantra has served exactly one population: whomever is not in control of federal policy. States Rights is not a real position unless you are a judge (who must consider the consequences of the law regardless of its merits). It is an excuse for why states have the right to do something we want them to.
This action proves that the people who scream loudest for states rights don't actually care about them. They just want to avoid cooperating with certain liberal policies that they don't like. And when it comes to states rights issues that actually affect everyone uniformly to the detriment of the voter, such as the national drinking age that is was enforced int he 1960's by threat of losing federal funding...well that's when everyone shuts up and takes it.
If there isn't at least one reference or primary source, it's not +1 Informative. Maybe the underused +1 Interesting?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 27 2017, @08:26PM
All you're saying is that when a person agrees with the federal government's stance, then some how that person magically no longer supports "States Rights"... What?
And, what does "liberal" have to do with anything? We see here an example of people not wanting to follow a "conservative" policy.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 27 2017, @09:05PM
Give him time. It takes some people longer than others to catch up to the changes in narrative they're told to follow.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 27 2017, @05:51PM
I wonder when retards will start to see this is proxy work for big corporations
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 27 2017, @10:39PM
You mean because Trump passed an executive order with no results? I mean, (1) It would be a Congressional action to deny them funding; (2) The Supreme Court has ruled that they can only deny funding on related matters - that is they could deny law enforcement funding - that is the one area with a big exception in Trump's "order"; (3) The amounts are really small... we're talking like 2% of most cities's budgets.
(Score: -1, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 27 2017, @03:42PM
You can guess the demographics of the constituents who elected Sally Hernandez...
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 27 2017, @05:48PM
Travis County, if I recall correctly, includes Austin, which is viewed as the Berkeley of Texas by Texans who live outside of Austin. Not only do they have hippie liberal types there, they also have Catholics (as an acquaintance of mine was told by her mother, when she was leaving home in Waco to go to U of Texas).
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 27 2017, @07:48PM
Cracks me up how afraid the religious are of hippies and catholics (the hippies/liberals of the religious world). Just shows how shaky their own faith is that their children can be "turned" against their own religion. Funny, when people find out the truth they tend to roll with it instead of doubling down on the crazy farm. If you're afraid of education tainting your child, then its time to reevaluate your own beliefs.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by tangomargarine on Friday January 27 2017, @03:54PM
When you flagrantly refuse to enforce the law--and that's your job--somebody higher-up gets mad at you.
Whodathunkit?
"Is that really true?" "I just spent the last hour telling you to think for yourself! Didn't you hear anything I said?"
(Score: 4, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 27 2017, @04:15PM
Except it is literally not their job.
Immigration is a federal issue, these are local cops.
They do it as a courtesy only. If the feds want these people they should spend their resources on them.
(Score: 2) by dyingtolive on Friday January 27 2017, @05:17PM
Interstate extradition is a thing. I'm not arguing for or against it, but it is interesting that there is no expectation of some analogue toward the federal government, at least, that I'm aware of.
Don't blame me, I voted for moose wang!
(Score: 3, Insightful) by tangomargarine on Friday January 27 2017, @05:59PM
One could argue more broadly that it's the job of every government employee to encourage compliance with the law.
"Is that really true?" "I just spent the last hour telling you to think for yourself! Didn't you hear anything I said?"
(Score: 4, Interesting) by meustrus on Friday January 27 2017, @06:57PM
Unless say you are an investigator who wants immigrants to report crimes, or a traffic analyst who wants immigrants to get driver's licenses (and therefore learn to drive before doing it), or a teacher who wants immigrants to learn English, or any number of other public functions that rely on society being integrated rather than segmented. Which is why compromise on immigration policy is nearly impossible: the only effective options are fast processes leading to citizenship and deportation. No middle ground is effective.
If there isn't at least one reference or primary source, it's not +1 Informative. Maybe the underused +1 Interesting?
(Score: 2) by jdavidb on Friday January 27 2017, @04:50PM
ⓋⒶ☮✝🕊 Secession is the right of all sentient beings
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 27 2017, @05:29PM
I thought most if not all countries had laws governing restrictions on who comes and goes, and how long someone can stay without a visa, applying for citizenship, etc. It always made sense to me.
What don't you like about those laws? What do you advocate instead?
(Score: 2) by jdavidb on Friday January 27 2017, @05:49PM
ⓋⒶ☮✝🕊 Secession is the right of all sentient beings
(Score: 2) by tangomargarine on Friday January 27 2017, @05:50PM
Everybody who's already here legally gets made a citizen, their college paid for, and a free boat, obviously. /s
"Is that really true?" "I just spent the last hour telling you to think for yourself! Didn't you hear anything I said?"
(Score: 2) by tangomargarine on Friday January 27 2017, @05:53PM
*illegally
dammit TM proofread :P
"Is that really true?" "I just spent the last hour telling you to think for yourself! Didn't you hear anything I said?"
(Score: 2) by dyingtolive on Friday January 27 2017, @06:59PM
I'll settle for what you were offering the first time around.
A strange world to me where we fail to properly take care of the people already here, and then we want more to come in whom we would hypothetically offer to take better care of.
Don't blame me, I voted for moose wang!
(Score: 2) by tangomargarine on Friday January 27 2017, @07:58PM
Yeah, bit of a telling Freudian slip there. One of Bernie's platform points was affordable college education, so take off the boat part and the il- and I'm for it.
"Is that really true?" "I just spent the last hour telling you to think for yourself! Didn't you hear anything I said?"
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 27 2017, @07:07PM
i was wondering what the current status was this morning!
BTW, if you wait too long while using tor soylent gives an error and wont let you post without starting over. if you post to fast it makes you wait. give me a break!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 27 2017, @07:34PM
>...give me a break!
"OK." crack!
OH MY MONITOR!!!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 27 2017, @08:08PM
if you post to fast it makes you wait
Is this 'fast' a competitor to SN? You should be posting here, not there!
Actually, why don't you take your lack of capitalization, lack of punctuation, and homonym problems over to fast instead?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 27 2017, @07:41PM
Why would a sanctuary city be eligible for federal funding in the first place?
Is it not a local issue? Aren't these areas monitored, staffed, and maintained by local city or county administrations? Or are these areas literally 'being paid for' by the federal gov't (us taxpayers)?
Perhaps there are occasional federal 'programs or grants' that fly through the area such as polio vaccinations or something. Is this what would be dropped?
Please inform me & others, thanks.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 27 2017, @08:06PM
"Sanctuary city" is a term applied to any city that does not disclose the legal status of its citizens. The whole city.
Though it is understandable that you write as if these sanctuary cities are an 'area', tent-camp, or shanty town apart from the city- as the media would have us thinking it's an independent zone where criminal illegals hide out.
Anyway, since cities are full of legal citizens too- any loss of federal funding would affect various safety funding, highway funding, and yes as you wrote- CDC or immunization outreach programs, etc. In otherwords such an act would place the city officials in an awkward position of choosing fed funding or 'squealing' on its inhabitants.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 27 2017, @10:17PM
New question: If illegally immigrated inhabitants of a city cannot legally hold a job and don't pay taxes (well, okay, sales tax, I suppose) and cannot vote, of what use are they to the city? Other than 'feelings', I mean.
I'm being equally serious here.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 27 2017, @10:33PM
"Equally serious?"
You are disingenuously stating your arguments as leading questions.
That's not even a true dialectic, its just smug assholeness.
Stop wasting people's time.
(Score: 2) by dyingtolive on Friday January 27 2017, @11:23PM
He might be being a smug asshole, but I wonder about it too. Let me try to rephrase in a less assholeish manner: "A city chooses to not disclose their (undocumented/illegal/whatever word you'd please) inhabitants. What benefit is there to the city and the rest of its inhabitants by following this course of action?"
I'm earnestly unopposed to the idea if there are benefits. Maybe it's a lack of imagination on my part, but I can't come up with anything substantial.
Don't blame me, I voted for moose wang!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 27 2017, @11:32PM
All those rapes eventually solve the unskilled labor gap caused by liberal millennials never growing up. They're the ones not having kids. They're the ones welcoming in their doom with open arms. They're the ones who won't fight back when it does happen. It maintains order in a properly managed post-scarcity society. Look to Europe for your future. Plato would probably be proud.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday January 28 2017, @02:48AM
Because they usually are paying some level of taxes such as payroll or sales, but their illegal status means they are consuming no personal benefits only general benefits like using the roads.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday January 28 2017, @04:43AM
When a portion of the population fear the police then they avoid all contact. That means they don't report crimes, and they don't come forward as witnesses. The police need the trust of the people to do their jobs. It also means that anyone can blackmail these people simply by threatening to get the police involved in a dispute. Even if the police will only detain people already arrested, not just randoms they encounter during the course of their duties that's not enough - the cost of getting deported is so great that people won't even take the tiniest chance of it happening to them so they avoid all contact.
These people are here regardless of what the law says. One approach is to pour as much shit and misery on them as possible in the hope that enough despair will cause them to just go away, the other approach is to respect their human dignity and maximize what contributions they can make to the community where they reside.
(Score: 2) by dyingtolive on Saturday January 28 2017, @11:08AM
That's probably the best rationalization for it I've heard. I'll need to think about that for a while, but it's pretty compelling.
Don't blame me, I voted for moose wang!