Seven of Aurora’s 10 City Council members used their time and power on Monday night to reiterate that police in the city will check the immigration status of people and tell ICE what it wants and needs to know for potential deportation cases.
The message is loud and clear: If you’re one of the hundreds of thousands of immigrants living in Aurora without legal status, you should be more than a little leery of the police just in case U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement has your name on a list.
We already spent time last month decrying silly resolutions that are needlessly divisive and have zero actual impact on public policy. Our local and state elected officials can stop spitting in the wind anytime they get tired of the blowback.
Did Aurora City Council members really think this resolution would magically erect a wall along the city’s border to prevent refugees and asylum seekers from entering from Denver? No, far more likely is that the seven members of the council who approved the message were hopeful it would appease Texas Gov. Gregg Abbott so he wouldn’t target them as a final destination for people who recently crossed the southern border.
Despite the line saying that the city “demands that other municipalities and entities do not systematically transport migrants” to Aurora, the resolution feels more like a bow down than a stand up. So did a similarly spineless resolution doubling down as a “non-sanctuary city” approved by a majority of city council members in Colorado Springs and in Fremont County.
So what exactly is a sanctuary city? That’s open to interpretation, but helpfully, the Aurora City Council is very specific in using the definition that President Donald Trump adopted with an executive order shortly after he took office in 2017. Trump defined “sanctuary jurisdictions” as any “jurisdictions that willfully refuse to comply with 8 U.S.C. 1373.”
8 U.S.C 1373 is a simple federal law barring state and local governments from refusing to give information “regarding the citizenship or immigration status, lawful or unlawful, of any individual” to federal agencies tasked with overseeing immigration and enforcing immigration laws.
The Denver Post editorial board has long advocated for a moderate approach on this issue. Dangerous criminals who are in the U.S. must be caught and deported (or put in prison and then deported upon release). Contributing members of society who are here without legal status must be able to access our emergency services without the fear that their immigration status will be handed over to ICE officials.
Denver like all cities has at times failed this careful balance with tragic result. We all remember Ever Valles who walked free from a Denver jail in December 2016 despite an ICE detainer marking him as an “immigration enforcement priority” only to participate in killing a man at an RTD light rail station a few months later.
Our hearts break for the family of Laken Riley, a 22-year-old nursing student who police suspect was killed by a Venezuelan border crosser who had been targeted for detainment by immigration officials. The suspect had been arrested in New York, but ICE said they failed to issue a detainer before he was released.
But these Colorado municipalities are not simply reaffirming their commitment to keep dangerous criminals out of the city. They are tying tragic cases like this to a population of people who have braved difficult conditions, left their lives and sometimes their families behind to start new in America. Yes, some violent criminals have also made their way north among those seeking refuge in the U.S. They should be arrested and deported.
Aurora, Colorado Springs and Fremont County passed resolutions that will do nothing to prevent Abbott and others from sending busloads of migrants, refugees and immigrants to their communities. What they have done instead is send a bone-chilling message to immigrants – some of whom have called their communities home for decades – that police in their community most definitely will not provide sanctuary. After all the council is “resolved” not to be labeled a sanctuary city.
Instead of passing a meaningless attempt to appease Abbott, these communities should have crafted actual policies to help immigrants and refugees.
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