Republicans called Democratic governors to Congress on Thursday to question them over their “sanctuary” policies. The governors came ready to play offense.
While Republican House members framed the hearing around crime and support for police, Governors JB Pritzker of Illinois, Tim Walz of Minnesota and Kathy Hochul of New York tried to make the hearing about President Donald Trump.
“I’m disappointed at a crucial inflection point in our nation’s history, Congress is choosing to spend its time trying to cast blame on states like Minnesota that had no hand in creating this crisis,” Walz said. “We should all be able to agree on a few principles: that everyone in America deserves due process, and that we live in a free country where people should not be locked up for exercising their basic constitutional rights.”
The governors and Democratic lawmakers made frequent references to the LA protests. Rather than simply defending their states’ immigration policies, they accused Trump of abusing his power by sending federal troops to California and of violating immigrants’ due process.
“It’s wrong to deploy the National Guard and active duty Marines into an American city over the objection of local law enforcement, just to inflame a situation and create a crisis,” Pritzker said. “Just as it’s wrong to tear children away from their homes and their mothers and fathers who have spent decades living and working in our communities, raising their families.”
“The president is usurping the sovereignty of another state,” Hochul said.
Republicans have been critical of jurisdictions with so-called sanctuary policies, which generally refer to laws that limit how local law enforcement can cooperate with federal immigration enforcement.
The Trump administration has targeted states with such laws, including California and Illinois, by trying to revoke their ability to get federal funding and bringing lawsuits against them.
Pritzker and Hochul said their states’ policies don’t prevent local police from turning unauthorized immigrants over to Immigration and Customs Enforcement on criminal warrants, while Walz pointed out that Minnesota does not have a statewide sanctuary law.
“Minnesota is not even a sanctuary state,” he said. “The Minnesota legislature has passed no such bill.”
Republicans had some fiery moments of their own. Rep. Elise Stefanik asked Hochul to identify various migrants who were arrested for committing crimes in the U.S.
“You are not advocating on behalf of these victims,” Stefanik said. “You are shielding illegals. Even in your opening statement, you prioritize putting illegals first.”
Rep. Jim Jordan pushed Hochul over whether an unauthorized migrant who committed a crime in New York would be turned over to police.
“That is sanctuary policy in a nutshell, and that is what your state supports, and so do these other governors,” Jordan said, referring to instances when migrants weren’t kept in police custody for ICE. “That is what is so wrong.”
Hochul responded by saying that some of those he referenced weren’t held in New York state prisons or by state officers, so it wasn’t her jurisdiction. In general, localities are limited by laws that set standards for the amount of time people can be held by police once they’ve finished serving their sentence. If ICE can’t pick them up in time, they have to be released.
“Maybe there’s a lesson in civics here that’s necessary,” Hochul said.
In the hearing, Democrats pointed to instances of citizen children being deported and wrongful arrests. The Trump administration has been sued several times for trying to deport migrants without due process.
“Illinois follows the law, but let me be clear, we expect the federal government to follow the law too,” Pritzker said. “We will not participate in abuses of power. We will not violate court orders. We will not ignore the Constitution. We will not defy the Supreme Court. We will not take away people’s rights to peacefully protest.”
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Casey Murray is a NOTUS reporter and an Allbritton Journalism Institute fellow.