On Monday’s “CNN This Morning,” Rep. James Walkinshaw (D-VA) said that sanctuary policies don’t interrupt immigration enforcement and “Federal immigration enforcement agents can detain anyone anywhere in the country. They don’t need assistance from local governments to do that. We know, in a lot of places, local jails, including in Minnesota, do cooperate and work with federal law enforcement when folks have serious criminal histories or there are criminal warrants. But we don’t need local government turned into federal immigration enforcement. That’s what they call sanctuary policies.”
USA Today White House Correspondent Francesca Chambers asked, “[W]hat do you think about these efforts to try and tie some immigration measures to it? Specifically, things around sanctuary cities have come up from Republicans. There’s also a question of a pathway to — not a pathway to citizenship, but, like, legally staying in the country with no pathway to citizenship, I think Rep. Mike Lawler (R-NY) brought up yesterday. What do you think of those sorts of measures that Republicans might try to tack on to this?”
Walkinshaw answered, “Yeah. And first, in terms of the so-called sanctuary cities argument, look, that’s an issue of federalism. State and local governments in this country get to set their policies, and those policies make sense for those communities. I don’t agree with the term –.”
Host Audie Cornish then cut in to ask, “Even if it interrupts what the federal law enforcement is doing?”
Walkinshaw answered, “I don’t agree that it interrupts. Having been in local government, what the Trump administration says is a sanctuary policy is actually their demand that local police, local sheriffs, local jails do the federal government’s job in enforcing immigration law. They call that a sanctuary policy. Federal immigration enforcement agents can detain anyone anywhere in the country. They don’t need assistance from local governments to do that. We know, in a lot of places, local jails, including in Minnesota, do cooperate and work with federal law enforcement when folks have serious criminal histories or there are criminal warrants. But we don’t need local government turned into federal immigration enforcement. That’s what they call sanctuary policies. I just think it’s false.”
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