U.S. Government Sues Its State Of California Over ‘Sanctuary Bill’: Top Five Questions Answered

The U.S. Department of Justice filed a lawsuit against the state of California over its immigrant-related policies. The lawsuit says three laws passed in California in 2017 obstruct federal immigration law and thus violate the U.S. Constitution's supremacy clause, which gives federal law precedence over state laws. The statutes "reflect a deliberate effort by California to obstruct the United States' enforcement of federal immigration law", the lawsuit said.

The laws in question prohibit employers from letting immigration agents enter work sites or view employee files without a subpoena or warrant, prohibit local law enforcement from alerting immigration agents when detainees are released from custody and stop local governments from contracting with for-profit companies and the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency (ICE) to hold immigrants. The laws also give the state of California the power to review conditions in facilities where immigrants are being detained by federal authorities.

California is home to some 2.3 million undocumented immigrants, according to a 2014 estimate by Pew Research Center. The most recent controversy on the issue of sanctuary cities was Oakland Mayor Libby Schaaf’s decision to warn of an immigration sweep in advance. ICE said the mayor's actions allowed hundreds of immigrants to elude detention.

The fight against the aggressive stance taken by Trump administration against illegal immigrants or undocumented residents of United States in California has been in the making since the new President took office.

What Is A Sanctuary State/ City In The U.S?

In October 2017, California governor Jerry Brown signed a bill into law that limits co-operation between local police and federal immigration enforcement officials against undocumented people in the state. The California bill, formally known as SB54, has been described as the most comprehensive in the country. Measures range from treating schools, courthouses and hospitals as “safe zones” in certain cities to restricting the ability of local police to detain people on behalf of federal immigration agents. The law does nothing to curtail the ability of federal agents to come into the state and deport people or carry out raids, but it does make such actions more difficult for agencies with limited resources.

The new law, according to author of the bill Senate Leader Kevin de Leon “is an attempt to put a large kink in Trump’s perverse and inhumane deportation machine,” according to the AP. The state has positioned the bill as a safety measure to ensure undocumented residents are unafraid to report crimes to the police or send their kids to school.

What Does A Sanctuary City Not Do?

It is important to note that, the term “sanctuary” gives the totally misleading impression that cities and states can stop immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents from entering, or from arresting immigrants. They can’t. The laws that immigration hawks have traditionally labeled “sanctuary” policies — are simply designed to make it harder for the federal government to use local governments as leverage in immigration enforcement.

How Many Cities In California Are Sanctuary Cities?

California as a state does not have the most number of cities designated as sanctuary cities in the U.S. It has only two as compared to Texas which has three. Sanctuary cities in California are San Francisco, and Los Angeles.

Is San Diego A Sanctuary City?

The then Mayor Kevin Faulconer’s in 2015 had clarified that despite San Diego being listed as a sanctuary city on various online resources, there’s no specific law or policy making it one – and that the city does work cooperatively with federal immigration authorities.

San Diego County is home to 743,500 immigrants, according to a report from the Immigrant Legal Resource Center but there is no figure that estimates the number of undocumented residents.

The California State University system, which includes San Diego, doesn’t use the word “sanctuary,” but last year declared it won’t cooperate with any federal policies that zero in on undocumented students. The University of California announced similar policies, and the University of San Diego’s president said he would form a task force to explore the issue.

Is Washington DC A Sanctuary City? Which Other Cities In The U.S. Are Sanctuary Cities?

According to website Aspan Law, the U.S. as of today has 18 known sanctuary cities. These cities are Washington DC, Baltimore, New York City, Detroit, Chicago, Minneapolis, Seattle, Portland, Salt Lake City, Denver, Miami, Dallas, Austin and Houston.

Conclusion

The fight over “sanctuary” policies is ultimately a fight over whether fear is a useful tool in immigration enforcement. The official position of the Trump administration is that any unauthorized immigrant in the U.S. should be “looking over [her] shoulder”. The biggest change to policy under Trump hasn’t been the scope of deportations or even of arrests — it’s been the aggressive messaging that anyone could be next.

(The above story first appeared on LatestLY on Mar 08, 2018 07:04 AM IST. For more news and updates on politics, world, sports, entertainment and lifestyle, log on to our website latestly.com).