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ICE Releases List Of Sanctuary Jurisdictions Which Could Lose Federal Funding

(Photo by Bryan Cox/U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement via Getty Images)

Alex Pfeiffer White House Correspondent
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Immigration and Customs Enforcement identified Monday 118 sanctuary jurisdictions around the country that could lose federal funds.

An executive order signed by President Trump in late January called for sanctuary jurisdictions to be stripped of federal funding and for ICE to release a weekly report on localities that ignore immigration detainers. Immigration detainers are a request from ICE to a jail or another local law enforcement agency to hold someone in violation of immigration law so they can be picked up.

Sanctuary counties and cities have been attempting to deny that they indeed ignore ICE detainers, but the report released Monday makes certain which places the federal government can indeed strip federal funding from. These sanctuary jurisdictions include Philadelphia; Clark County, Nev.; Washington D.C.; Boston; Newark; New York City; Chicago; Milwaukee and all of Rhode Island’s state prisons.

The ICE report details how within the week of Jan. 28 and Feb. 3 jurisdictions declined to enforce 206 detainers issued by ICE. This was out of a total of 3,083 detainers issued that week.

A significant portion of these detainers were ignored by Travis County, Texas. In the period of one week, Travis County refused to honor detainers for 12 immigrants from Central America charged with sexual assault. Travis County’s sheriff has vowed to not cooperate with ICE and Texas Gov. Gregg Abbott has restricted some law enforcement funding from the jurisdiction.

Dozens of other detainers were ignored by other jurisdictions for immigrants charged or convicted with crimes such as assault or DUI. ICE is set to release similar reports weekly throughout the Trump administration.