Republican Arizona lawmakers are pushing a bill that would ban state agencies and local governments from refusing to cooperate with federal immigration officials.
Senate President Warren Petersen’s Senate Bill 1164 would require county sheriffs, local police and the Arizona Department of Corrections to use their “best efforts to support the enforcement of federal immigration law,” and would prohibit state agencies and municipalities from adopting rules specifically designed to thwart that support.
Petersen, a Gilbert Republican, said the legislation is primarily designed to ensure state prisons and local jails cooperate with detainer requests from the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, or ICE.
Federal immigration officers issue those requests when they believe state or local law enforcement have a person in custody who is in the country without legal authorization.
“We want to make sure if somebody is here illegally, you've committed a state crime, you're going to be picked up from prison or jail and not released into the community where you could commit more crimes,” Petersen said.
But critics argue the bill is too broad and won’t just target criminals.
“I'm very much concerned with what individual public safety people are going to take into their own hands and racially profile people and detain them and harass them,” Sen. Sally Ann Gonzales (D-Tucson) said.
Critics also pointed out that many individuals in local jails have yet to be convicted of a crime and that ICE detainer orders are sometimes issued in error against those who do have legal status, including U.S. citizens.
“The mere evidence that somebody's arrested doesn't mean they've necessarily committed a crime,” said Douglas Kouffie, an attorney for the wife of a U.S. Army veteran and legal resident recently detained by ICE in Arizona.
Sen. Catherine Miranda (D-Phoenix) argued the bill would create fear in immigrant communities, making them less likely to cooperate with law enforcement and increase response times to other crimes.
“Most major agencies are short-staffed and overextended,” she said. “We are mandating all detectives work patrol shifts to help, and this will slow law enforcement's response to violent crimes.”
Petersen downplayed the potential for racial profiling, saying once a person is detained for committing a crime, law enforcement would then determine whether they are in the country legally.
“The bottom line is, you've committed a crime. It has nothing to do with racial profiling,” he said.
But even Petersen acknowledged the bill will go beyond forcing local governments to honor ICE detainer requests.
“I didn't say my only intent was detainers,” Petersen told his fellow lawmakers.
Noah Schramm, a border policy strategist at the ACLU of Arizona, said vague language in the law could be used to force local law enforcement to enter more robust immigrant enforcement agreements with the federal government.
Under the bill, the attorney general or any individual taxpayer may file a lawsuit if they believe a sheriff, police department or the state prison system isn’t using “its best effort to support the enforcement of federal immigration law.”
“Our concerns, taken together, this is a recipe for frivolous, politically motivated lawsuits, which will have the effect of increasingly driving law enforcement to do federal immigration enforcement,” Schramm said.
The original language in Petersen’s bill sought to do just that by requiring sheriffs and the Department of Corrections to enter so-called 287(g) agreements with the federal government, which lay out ways in which local agencies can coordinate and support federal immigration officers.
But an amendment by Sen. David Gowan (R-Sierra Vista) removed that language and instead directed law enforcement to make their “best efforts” to support federal immigration enforcement.
The bill passed the Arizona Senate’s Military Affairs and Border Security Committee on a party-line vote on Monday as immigrant rights groups protested outside the Arizona Capitol against the GOP-backed immigration legislation and broader efforts to reshape the federal government by the Trump administration.
Many of those protesters were blocked from entering the state Senate before the hearing on SB 1164.
Senate Republican spokeswoman Kim Quinter said the Arizona Department of Public Safety and Senate security staff jointly made the decision to block protesters from entering the building.
“DPS and Senate Security exercised this discretion based on aggressive behavior displayed by protesters, including but not limited to, protesters using force at the front doors of the Senate to enter the premises, instead of heeding instructions from law enforcement on safe and orderly entry,” Quintero said in a statement. “As a result, DPS and Senate Security implemented precautionary measures while still allowing as many members of the public to enter the building for public testimony as possible.”
But the spokesman for the department of Public Safety disputed that characterization.
“The Senate leadership made that decision independently,” spokesman Bart Graves said.
