SAN DIEGO (Border Report) — The San Diego County Board of Supervisors has voted to prevent the use of its resources and funding to assist federal immigration agents with deportations.
The board voted 3 – 1 in favor of the measure, with Supervisor Joel Anderson being absent.
The county will restrict use of its jails, county buildings and personnel to help agents with federal immigration enforcement.
“San Diego County has always been a place where communities are valued, not divided and as a County Supervisor, I’m committed to leading a local government that promotes unity, equity, and justice for all, while upholding the law,” said County Chairwoman Nora Vargas. “We will not allow our local resources to be used for actions that that separate families, harm community trust, or divert critical local resources away from addressing our most pressing challenges. Immigration enforcement is a federal responsibility, and our County will not be a tool for policies that hurt our residents.”
The lone dissent vote came from Republican Jim Desmond, who called the vote “an affront to every law-abiding citizen.”
“This reckless measure not only goes far beyond California’s already extreme sanctuary state laws, but actively endangers our communities by shielding illegal immigrant criminals from deportation,” Desmond said. “Consider this: under this policy, law enforcement is prohibited from notifying ICE about individuals, in custody, who have committed violent and heinous crimes, including rape and stalking, assault and battery, burglary, child abuse and more.
According to the measure, it won’t interfere with federal criminal investigations, but it would leave federal agents with the responsibility of handling immigration enforcement.
San Diego joins several other counties in California to enact similar measures to make it harder for the federal government to deport unlawful residents.
In 2019, Santa Clara County adopted a board policy that limits the cooperation of county officials and employees with Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). Similarly, the San Diego County board policy says the county shall not provide assistance or cooperation to ICE in its civil immigration enforcement efforts, including by giving ICE agents access to individuals or allowing them to use county facilities for investigative interviews or other purposes, expending county time or resources responding to ICE inquiries or communicating with ICE regarding individuals’ incarceration status or release dates, or otherwise participating in any civil immigration enforcement activities.
Read: Read More