Immigration laws — like all laws — should be enforced. Even so, Washington state’s recently approved prohibition on local law enforcement authorities asking about people’s immigration status makes sense.
The legislation approved this year, and signed into law by Gov. Jay Inslee, makes Washington the latest West Coast state — joining California and Oregon — to enact so-called sanctuary protections.
None of this means immigration law will not be enforced in Washington state (or Oregon or California), it simply means that the authority to enforce the law falls to the federal officials who work for Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
“Our state agencies are not immigration-enforcement agencies,” said Inslee, who is one of two dozen Democrats running for president in 2020. “We will not be complicit in the Trump administration’s depraved efforts to break up hardworking immigrant and refugee families.”
Politics aside, which is extremely difficult to do when the governor is running for president, the heart of the issue would seem to be to insolate local police and sheriff’s offices from becoming de facto immigration officers. They already have plenty to do without checking on legal status.
And, keep in mind, that’s extremely difficult to do in Washington state where proof of citizenship is not a requirement to obtain a state driver’s license.
Under the new Washington state law, according to The Associated Press, local law-enforcement agencies are broadly prohibited from asking about immigration status or place of birth unless directly connected to a criminal investigation, and both local jails and state prisons are prohibited from complying with voluntary “immigration holds” requested by federal authorities, or from notifying federal authorities when an immigrant is about to be released from their custody.
The goal of this action in Washington is to guard against all Washingtonians from feeling harassed over their legal status. Washington is a diverse state and we agree that all should feel welcome.
Sen. Lisa Wellman, D-Mercer Island — and the legislation’s sponsor — said immigrants shouldn’t have to worry that police might demand “papers” at any moment.
“We have 30 percent of Microsoft (workforce) here on visas,” Wellman said.
That’s only a small segment of the legal immigrants working in this state. A great number of immigrants also work on this side of the Cascades.
The approach taken in Washington’s new law is consistent with executive orders issued by Inslee. The law now has simply been expanded to so this approach now includes all local law enforcement.
Police offices and sheriff’s deputies throughout Walla Walla County should not be distracted from their local duties by having to serve as immigration officers.