Sanctuary city
A sanctuary city is a municipality that limits or denies its cooperation with the national government in enforcing immigration law.
Proponents of sanctuary cities cite motives such as reducing the fear of persons who illegally immigrated from deportation, separation of immigrant families, reporting crimes, using health and social services, and enrolling their children into a school.
Opponents of sanctuary cities argue that they undermine the rule of law by not cooperating with federal immigration authorities. They also highlight concerns about public safety, pointing to cases where a person involved in violent crimes was released instead of being handed over to proper authorities. Critics claim that sanctuary cities act as magnets for illegal immigration, attracting more people to enter unlawfully. They also argue that these cities place a strain on local resources, as persons which have illegally immigrated may access public services like healthcare, housing, and education.
Some studies on the relationship between sanctuary status and crime have found that sanctuary policies either have no effect on crime or that sanctuary cities have lower crime rates and stronger economies than comparable non-sanctuary cities. In 2016 The Washington Post reported that in the United States "decades of research actually shows that immigrantswhether legal or illegaltend to have lower crime rates". Similarly, a 2017 report by the Center for American Progress concluded that "statistical analysis illustrates that across a range of social and economic indicators, sanctuary counties perform better than comparable nonsanctuary counties." A 2017 review in Sociology Compass concluded that "he few empirical studies that exist illustrate a 'null' or negative relationship between these policies and crime."
Sanctuary city policies substantially reduce deportations of illegal immigrants who do not have criminal records, but have no impact on those who have violent criminal records. Opponents of sanctuary cities argue that cities should assist the national government in enforcing immigration law. Supporters of sanctuary cities argue that enforcement of federal law is not the duty of localities, and that law enforcement resources can be prioritized towards better purposes.
European cities have drawn inspiration from the sanctuary movement in American cities. However, the term "sanctuary city" in Europe generally refers to cities committed to supporting legal refugees and asylum seekers, not illegal immigration. Over 80 towns and cities across the United Kingdom adopt policies aimed at fostering community connections, raising awareness, and building cultural ties to support these groups. Glasgow and Swansea have become noted sanctuary cities.
United States
In the United States, municipal policies include prohibiting police or city employees from questioning people about their immigration status and refusing requests by national immigration authorities to detain people beyond their release date, if they were jailed for breaking local law. Such policies can be set expressly in law or observed in practice, but the designation "sanctuary city" does not have a precise legal definition.History
The movement that established sanctuary cities in the United States began in the early 1980s. The movement traces its roots to religious philosophy, as well as the histories of resistance movements to perceived state injustices. The sanctuary city movement took place in the 1980s to challenge the US government's refusal to grant asylum to certain Central American refugees. These asylum seekers were arriving from countries in Central America like El Salvador and Guatemala that were politically unstable. More than 75,000 Salvadoreans and 200,000 Guatemalans were killed in civil wars.Faith-based groups in the US Southwest initially drove the movement of the 1980s, with eight churches publicly declaring to be sanctuaries in March 1982. John Fife, a minister and movement leader, famously wrote in a letter to U.S. attorney general William Smith: "the South-side United Presbyterian Church will publicly violate the Immigration and Nationality Act by allowing sanctuary in its church for those from Central America."
A milestone in the U.S. sanctuary city movement occurred in 1985 in San Francisco, which passed the largely symbolic "City of Refuge" resolution. A 1985 city ordinance prohibited the use of city funds and resources to assist federal immigration enforcement—the defining characteristic of a sanctuary city in the US. As of 2018, more than 560 cities, states and counties considered themselves sanctuaries. Some have questioned the accuracy of the term "sanctuary city" as used in the US.
Terminology
Several different terms and phrases are used to describe immigrants who entered U.S. illegally.The term alien, primarily used between the 1970s and 2010s American news sources, is considered by many immigrant rights advocates to be derogatory and dehumanizing. According to the data analytics company LexisNexis, the usage of the term alien in reports on immigration has declined substantially, making up just 5% of terms used major news media in 2013. The U.S. Citizenship Act of 2021, which President Joe Biden proposed to Congress, would eliminate the word "alien" from federal immigration laws and replace it with "noncitizen".
Usage of the word "illegal" and phrases using the word has declined, accounting for 82% of language used in 1996, 75% in 2002, 60% in 2007, and 57% in 2013.
Several other phrases are used: undocumented immigrant ; unauthorized immigrant, and undocumented person or undocumented people. In this context, undocumented generally does not refer to statelessness, but to illegal immigration status.
Media outlets' policies as to use of terms differ, and no consensus has yet emerged in the press. In 2013, the Associated Press changed its AP Stylebook to provide that "Except in direct quotes essential to the story, use illegal only to refer to an action, not a person: illegal immigration, but not illegal immigrant. Acceptable variations include living in or entering a country illegally or without legal permission." Within several weeks, major U.S. newspapers such as Chicago Tribune, the Los Angeles Times, and USA Today adopted similar guidance. The New York Times style guide states that the term illegal immigrant may be considered "loaded or offensive" and advises journalists to "explain the specific circumstances of the person in question or to focus on actions: who crossed the border illegally; who overstayed a visa; who is not authorized to work in this country." The style book discourages the use of illegal as a noun and the alien. The stylebook notes that unauthorized and undocumented are acceptable, but the former "has a flavor of euphemism and should be used with caution outside quotation" and the latter has a "bureaucratic tone." The Washington Post stylebook "says 'illegal immigrant' is accurate and acceptable, but notes that some find it offensive"; the Post "does not refer to people as 'illegal aliens' or 'illegals,'" per its guidelines.
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Electoral politics
The issue entered presidential politics in the race for the 2008 Republican Party presidential nomination.Colorado Congressman Tom Tancredo ran on an anti-illegal immigration platform and specifically attacked sanctuary cities. Former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney accused former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani of running it as a sanctuary city. Mayor Giuliani's campaign responded saying that Governor Romney ran a sanctuary Governor's mansion, and that New York City is not a "haven" for illegal immigrants.
In July 2015, 32-year-old Kathryn Steinle was fatally shot by an illegal immigrant who had previously been deported 5 times. The shooting took place in San Francisco, a sanctuary city, sparking national debate over immigration and sanctuary city policies. Former Secretary of State and presidential candidate Hillary Clinton told CNN that "The city made a mistake, not to deport someone that the federal government strongly felt should be deported. I have absolutely no support for a city that ignores the strong evidence that should be acted on." The following day, her campaign stated: "Hillary Clinton believes that sanctuary cities can help further public safety, and she has defended those policies going back years."
Trump administration
On March 6, 2018, the U.S. Department of Justice sued the state of California, the Governor Jerry Brown, and the state's attorney general, Xavier Becerra, over three recently-passed state laws, saying the laws made it impossible for federal immigration officials to do their jobs and deport criminals who were born outside the United States. The Justice Department called the laws unconstitutional and asked a judge to block them. The lawsuit said the state laws "reflect a deliberate effort by California to obstruct the United States' enforcement of federal immigration law."The Trump administration previously released a list of immigration principles to Congress. The list included funding a wall along the U.S.-Mexico border, a crackdown on the influx of Central American minors, and curbs on federal grants to sanctuary cities. A pledge to strip "all federal funding to sanctuary cities" was a key Trump campaign theme. President Trump issued an executive order which declared that jurisdictions that "refuse to comply" with 8 U.S.C. 1373—a provision of federal law on information sharing between local and federal authorities—would be ineligible to receive federal grants.
States and cities have shown varying responses to the executive order. Thirty-three states introduced or enacted legislation requiring local law enforcement to cooperate with ICE officers and requests to hold non-citizen inmates for deportation. Other states and cities have responded by not cooperating with federal immigration efforts or by showcasing welcoming policies towards immigrants. California openly refused the administration's attempts to "clamp down on sanctuary cities". A federal judge in San Francisco agreed with two California municipalities that a presidential attempt to cut them off from federal funding for not complying with deportation requests was unconstitutional, ultimately issuing a nationwide permanent injunction against the facially unconstitutional provisions of the order.
On March 27, 2018, the all-Republican Board of Supervisors in Orange County, California voted to join the Justice Department's lawsuit against the state. In Chicago, a federal judge ruled that the Trump administration may not withhold public safety grants to sanctuary cities. These decisions have been seen as a setback to the administration's efforts to force local jurisdictions to help federal authorities with the policing of illegal immigrants. On July 5, 2018, a federal judge upheld two of California's Sanctuary laws but struck down a key provision in the third.
Local officials who oppose the president's policies say that complying with federal immigration officers will ruin the trust established between law enforcement and immigrant communities. Supporters of the president's policies say that protection of immigrants from enforcement makes communities less safe and undermines the rule of law. On July 12, 2019, federal appeals court in Seattle in a 2-to-1 opinion overturned a nationwide injunction issued last year by a federal judge in Los Angeles. The appeals court said awarding extra points in the application process to cities that cooperate was consistent with the goals of the grant program created by Congress.
The Department of Justice publishes a list of jurisdictions with policies, laws or regulations that obstruct enforcement of federal immigration laws determined by a review of laws, ordinances, and executive directives. The list was instituted per Executive Order 14287.