D.C. police to start limited cooperation with ICE

The Metropolitan Police Department will now be allowed to report illegal immigrants they encounter to federal deportation authorities under a new order issued Thursday by Chief Pamela A. Smith that breaks with the city’s longstanding status as a migrant sanctuary.

Officers are still barred from making immigration arrests on behalf of the feds, nor can they share information about when a deportation target is about to be released.

But they can share information about persons not in MPD custody, such as those encountered during traffic stops, Chief Smith said. And they can provide transportation for people being held in immigration custody by the feds.

The move comes just days after President Trump announced he was taking over the police department and deploying more federal agents to help stop what he said was a disturbing level of crime.

Mr. Trump on Thursday hailed the new moves toward limited cooperation.

“That’s a very positive step,” he said. “I think it’s going to happen all over the country.”

Chief Smith’s new orders draw a line between those in police custody and those merely encountered but not in custody. The former, she suggested in her order, are still protected due to the city’s sanctuary laws. But the latter are not.

The city’s chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union decried the move, calling it “dangerous and unnecessary.”

“Immigration enforcement is not the role of local police — and when law enforcement aligns itself with ICE, it fosters fear among D.C. residents, regardless of citizenship status,” the ACLU said.

Sanctuary policies restrict cooperation with federal immigration authorities.

Some jurisdictions have strict policies that refuse to hold illegal immigrants for pickup and even try to block federal agents from operating. Others are less strict and allow information sharing, such as the release time of a deportation target, but won’t hold them.

Washington’s policies have tended toward the strict side.

The city bars U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement from access to its facilities. That includes prohibiting ICE from being able to talk to potential deportation targets in custody.

Russell Hott, head of ICE’s deportation office in the Washington region, told WJLA-TV in April that he would rate Washington as a “0” on a scale of 0-10 for cooperation.

“We regularly see dangerous criminal aliens being released from central booking without any notification,” he said.

He also rated Fairfax County and Arlington County, in Virginia, as sanctuaries.

Sanctuary defenders say cooperating with the feds scares immigrants — both legal and illegal — from reporting crimes or serving as witnesses, making communities less safe.

ICE and its defenders challenge that conclusion. The agency says its targets are generally those with a criminal record and those already ordered deported by an immigration judge, and refusing to cooperate in those cases puts criminals and scofflaws out on the streets, usually back in immigrant communities.

ICE also said sanctuary policies backfire because the agency must send teams of officers out into communities to arrest targets, and that leads to the very community unrest that sanctuaries say they’re trying to avoid.

The Justice Department labeled Washington a sanctuary in its list published earlier this month. Homeland Security has also labeled the city a sanctuary in its since-retracted list.

Mayor Muriel Bowser had proposed slackening the city’s sanctuary laws earlier this year, but that ran into opposition with the city council.

The U.S. House has approved a bill to overturn the city’s sanctuary policy, but that measure has not seen action in the Senate.