The Justice Department sued New York and Chicago for allegedly interfering with the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown. Federal prosecutors are investigating an Upstate New York sheriff’s office the agency blames for releasing an undocumented immigrant from custody in defiance of an arrest warrant. Tom Homan, the White House immigration czar, has warned he’ll be “bringing hell” to Boston if the city’s police chief continues to abide by sanctuary policies. President Trump has moved aggressively to compel local law enforcement agencies to actively assist with his plans for mass deportations. Their involvement is considered crucial because of the limited resources and staffing of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, the Washington Post reports. Officials are frustrated that the pace of arrests and deportations has failed to meet the president's expectations.
Some local leaders contend the confrontational tactics risk undermining the broader public safety goals that Trump promoted during his campaign, when he pledged to “back the blue” by providing more support for local police. The president is vowing to withhold tens of millions of dollars in criminal justice grants to “sanctuary jurisdictions,” whose policies limit local cooperation with federal immigration enforcement. Critics say cutting those grants and potentially prosecuting officials would jeopardize programs designed to fight crime and would exacerbate tensions and mistrust between federal and local partners. “As a practical matter, it’s extraordinarily counterproductive for them to cut off the very types of grants and relationships where the federal government works collaboratively with local governments on actually dealing with crimes,” said James Williams, executive of Santa Clara County in California. “That doesn’t help anybody.” Last month, Santa Clara County joined San Francisco; Portland, Ore.,; New Haven, Conn.,; and King County, Wa., in a lawsuit challenging Trump’s targeting of sanctuary jurisdictions.