Homeland Security released a name-and-shame list of hundreds of states, counties and cities it identifies as “sanctuary” jurisdictions that refuse some level of cooperation with the federal government in arresting and deporting illegal immigrants.
Fourteen states were listed in full, as were most of the cities and counties in the close-in Washington metropolitan region.
California led the way, with the state being labeled a sanctuary and 111 cities and counties also having sanctuary policies.
On the other side were states such as Florida and Texas and a dozen others, which had no sanctuary jurisdictions listed at all.
All told, nearly 600 cities and counties are listed.
The department said it will issue formal notifications to each jurisdiction that made the list, warning of potential consequences, including “potential violations of federal criminal statutes.”
“These sanctuary city politicians are endangering Americans and our law enforcement in order to protect violent criminal illegal aliens,” Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem said. “We are exposing these sanctuary politicians who harbor criminal illegal aliens and defy federal law.”
In the metropolitan area, the District of Columbia is listed as is the state of Maryland. So are the counties of Arlington, Fairfax, Montgomery, Prince George’s, Prince William, Anne Arundel, Howard, Charles and Baltimore, and the cities of Alexandria, Manassas, Annapolis, Baltimore, Cheverly, College Park, Greenbelt, Hyattsville, Edmonston, Mount Rainier, Rockville, Takoma Park — spelled “Tacoma” on the department’s list.
All told, Virginia had 33 cities and counties on the list, while Maryland counted 18.
There is no universally accepted definition of a sanctuary, and policies range in severity.
Some jurisdictions will decline to hold illegal immigrants for pickup but will notify U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers if they are releasing a deportation target.
Other jurisdictions refuse all cooperation to the point that a senior ICE official told The Washington Times during the Biden administration that emails from ICE were automatically bounced back.
Some jurisdictions will also notify ICE depending on the seriousness of the crime.
Rhode Island’s statewide sanctuary policy is imposed by a court order, Homeland Security said.
The department said its new list names places that are “deliberately obstructing” federal enforcement.
The administration has already brought test lawsuits against New York and Illinois over those states’ policies.
Meanwhile, sanctuary jurisdictions have sued to stop the president from withholding grant money from sanctuaries. A federal judge in California has ruled for the sanctuaries and issued an injunction against the administration in that case.
“The threat to withhold funding causes them irreparable injury in the form of budgetary uncertainty, deprivation of constitutional rights, and undermining trust between the cities and counties and the communities they serve,” said U.S. District Judge William Orrick.
Thursday’s list is a redux of an attempt made in the first Trump administration.
That previous list ran into difficulties and was quickly discontinued after it wrongly listed jurisdictions that do cooperate.
Homeland Security, while saying it was notifying the jurisdictions on its new list, also included a disclaimer that “no one should act on this information without conducting their own evaluation of the information.”
• Stephen Dinan can be reached at sdinan@washingtontimes.com.