IOWA CITY, Iowa (AP) - Iowa City officials are considering denying local funding for federal immigration enforcement.
The City Council has directed City Attorney Eleanor Dilkes to draft a resolution that would in part deny allocation of local resources to federal immigration enforcement, the Iowa City Press-Citizen (https://icp-c.com/2iAT90L ) reported.
The resolution will include exceptions for violent offenders or public safety threats where cooperation with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement would be necessary. The council will vote on the resolution after a public-comment period.
But the council stopped short of pursuing a “sanctuary city” label. Council members agreed last month to discuss the designation amid requests from community members. Mayor Jim Throgmorton said the requests for Iowa City to declare itself a sanctuary city came in part as a response to the election of President-elect Donald Trump.
Throgmorton said during a meeting Tuesday that much of the opposition to the designation has come from non-residents.
“Rather than respond immediately, simply on the basis of their request, and knowing that this is a very controversial topic, I thought we should proceed cautiously, deliberately, as a matter of good governance,” the mayor said.
In a December memo, Dilkes said federal regulations related to ICE detainment requests to hold people based solely on questionable immigration documentation do not legally bind the city’s police department or the Johnson County Jail.
“There is not a federal law currently,” the city attorney said. “If there was to be a federal law passed like that, saying we had to help them, then the constitutional issues would come into play.”
City Councilman Rockne Cole recommended that the city also reach out to professors specializing in immigration law at the University of Iowa to create a community task force to review the city’s decisions.
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Information from: Iowa City Press-Citizen, https://www.press-citizen.com/
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