Three More Cities Join Revolt Against California Sanctuary State Law

Los Alamitos council meeting (KABC-7 via Associated Press)
KABC-7 via Associated Press

Three more cities have joined the revolt against California’s “sanctuary state” law, as opposition to the state — and support for a federal government lawsuit against it — grows.

U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions traveled to California in early March to announce that the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) would be suing the state of California over its sanctuary state law.

City council members of Orange County city Los Alamitos started a domino effect with a late March vote to reject the state’s sanctuary law, SB 54, and to cooperate with federal immigration law enforcement instead. The city also voted to set into motion the preparation of an amicus brief to join the DOJ lawsuit.

Orange County supervisors voted unanimously shortly thereafter to join in the DOJ lawsuit as well.

Orange County city Fountain Valley joined the lawsuit in early April, as did Huntington Beach, and the city of Escondido in San Diego County. Around the same time, the city of Hesperia in San Bernardino County also moved to file an amicus brief in support of the suit. Orange County cities Mission Viejo, San Juan Capistrano, and Aliso Viejo joined the suit the same week.

Breitbart News Senior Editor-At-Large Joel Pollak reported, “The lawsuit targets three statutes: the Immigrant Worker Protection Act (HB 450), the Inspection and Review of Facilities Housing Federal Detainees law (AB 103); and the California Values Act (SB 54).”

The Orange County cities of Newport Beach and Orange also voted to join the amicus brief last week. Westminster joined its neighboring cities on Wednesday to become the most recent city to join in the DOJ lawsuit. That’s three cities just this past week that voted to join the effort to oppose California’s sanctuary state law, according to Fox News.

More cities have made moves against the sanctuary state law. Some have held debates over the issue, while others have talked about scheduling discussions on the matter. Yorba Linda, San Marcos, West Covina, San Dimas, and others are among these. More cities are likely to dive in, given prior vocal opposition to the law.

In March 2017, ahead of SB 54’s passage, eight San Diego County mayors protested the bill, according to local 10 News. The mayors of Poway, El Cajon, Coronado, Escondido, La Mesa, San Marcos, Santee, and Vista denounced the bill as dangerous to their residents.

This past week, California Governor Jerry Brown became the final border state governor to accept additional National Guard troops at President Donald Trump’s request. Trump recently announced that he was sending around 2,000 to 4,000 National Guard troops to the border, but that he would be working with the governors of those states to do so.

The governors of Texas, Arizona, and New Mexico accepted the troops in short order to guard the U.S. southern border with Mexico. Brown was quiet about his decision until announcing this week that he would accept the troops while being careful to stipulate that they would not be enforcing federal immigration law. His office stipulated that those troops would not necessarily go to the southern border.

Follow Michelle Moons on Twitter @MichelleDiana 

Photo: file

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