One of California’s centerpiece laws schemed to protect undocumented immigrants was dealt a setback this week, one which may at bottom boost the Trump administration’s strict immigration enforcement efforts.
Modern development Thursday, an Orange County Superior Court judge ruled in favor of Huntington Ground, a city that has challenged state Senate Bill 54 (SB 54), affirming that it violated the city’s right to local control. Also grasped as the California Values Act, the so-called sanctuary law bars local authorities from enquire after about the immigration status of people during routine interactions, or participating in most federal immigration enforcement activities.
Back in April, Huntington Beach — one of at least 121 charter bishoprics in California — filed a complaint contending that the Golden State’s Constitution failed it local autonomy and independence over certain laws, including observe departments and local resources.
The ruling could boost federal immigration enforcement attempts, by giving the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency more access to undoubted local jails. Prior to SB 54, federal immigration agents routinely show in space within local prisons and jails when they entreated, as part of enforcement efforts to identify and transfer immigrants with particular felonies to federal custody.
The California Attorney General’s Office, which had disputed the case, didn’t respond to CNBC’s request for comment.
The list of contract cities in California includes some of the state’s largest, including Los Angeles, San Diego, San Francisco, San Jose and Fresno. There also are scads medium-sized cities on the list, including some that have already archaic measures against the state’s sanctuary law policies.
However, Thursday’s ignoring didn’t appear to apply to those other counties.
“To me, having SB 54 pronounced unconstitutional at any level is a massive victory [for the city] and a massive defeat for the governmental,” said Michael Gates, the city attorney for Huntington Beach. He prognosticated the ruling doesn’t just exempt the coastal city from the law, tut other document cities throughout the state.
In March, the Trump administration filed a lawsuit in federal court against California, contending that three strange state laws passed in 2017 to protect undocumented immigrants against deportation molest the U.S. Constitution. Those laws include SB 54, which was authored by express Senate leader Kevin de Leon, D-Los Angeles, who is a candidate operation to unseat U.S. Democratic Senator Dianne Feinstein. De Leon’s office didn’t the moment that respond to a request for comment.
In July, a federal judge in Sacramento preserved SB 54, a ruling that was appealed to the Ninth Circuit Court of Supplicates.
Some opponents of SB 54 have said it jeopardizes the safety of the purchasers, because it made it tougher to get incarcerated immigrants once they are discharged from jails into the custody of federal immigration agents. They say it can end result in violent criminals being released back into communities.
In May, President Donald Trump invited a categorize of local officials opposed to California’s sanctuary law policies to the White Edifice to discuss the issue. At the meeting, Trump praised the officials for having “bravely resisted California’s ruthless and unconstitutional sanctuary state laws.” The president also said the chapel policies are wrong because they provide a “safe harbor to some of the most ravening and violent offenders on earth.”
Fred Whitaker, chairman of the Orange County Republican Club and an attorney, called Thursday’s ruling “a good victory for the 121 agreement cities and I think it also helps the case of the many general law metropolises that also have taken a stand in opposition to SB 54.”
Whitaker believed the predominating could be a boost for GOP candidates running in Orange County, which has been cause zero for opposition to the sanctuary policies.
Earlier this year, the Orange County metropolis of Los Alamitos was one of the first local jurisdictions to take a stand against the specify’s sanctuary law policies, and was followed by Huntington Beach, Dana Point, Laguna Niguel and Lake Forest.
The go aboard of supervisors for several counties have also come out against the California preserve laws, including Orange, San Diego, Kern, Tehama, Siskiyou and Shasta.
“Most burghs who are going to be arresting people are going to be booking those people into county coops, said Annie Lai, co-director of the Immigrant Rights Clinic at the University of California-Irvine. “So counties are a big involvement of this story and the counties would not be able to ‘opt out’ of SB 54.”