San Mateo County has joined a growing movement to no longer detain jailed individuals for the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, except in unusual circumstances.
In a statement made in June, Sheriff’s Deputy Rebecca Rosenblatt said San Mateo County would stop detaining persons for ICE once they have been cleared for release.
“We have decided we will modify our policy to state that (ICE) holds will not be honored or placed on individuals in custody (by the San Mateo Sheriff’s Department) unless a rare exception arises in cases of individuals who pose significant public safety concerns,” said Rosenblatt.
San Mateo County joins Alameda, Contra Costa and San Francisco counties in declining to hold individuals who pose no significant public safety concerns, said Rosenblatt.
In January, the California Trust Act went into effect that allows local law enforcement to decline to comply with federal hold requests if the person has not been charged with a serious offense.
Also in June, San Francisco Sheriff Ross Mirkarimi stated that his jail would not hold people for ICE after they are cleared for release from county custody.
“My long-held belief is that local law enforcement should not be in the civil immigration detainer business,” Mirkarimi was quoted as saying in a story in the San Francisco Examiner. “Public safety is not advanced and could be hindered when immigrant communities fear the repercussions of cooperating with law enforcement.”
Federal immigration hold requests rose after the Obama administration created the Secure Communities program, unifying similar programs within the FBI and Department of Homeland Security.
Through the Secure Communities program, local law enforcement would send arrest information, such as birthplaces and fingerprints, to immigration officials. That information would then be crosschecked to determine residency status. If a person’s status came back as “undocumented,” ICE could place a request with local law enforcement to hold that person, usually for 48 hours, while ICE officials conducted their own investigation.
Those individuals would be held at local taxpayers’ expense and in violation of their constitutional rights, according to recent court rulings. Those cases in favor of the immigrants, and the Trust Act, have allowed a shift in local policy in regard to immigration holds.
“We’re leaving the door open for the off chance that something comes up that doesn’t fall within this policy. There can be exceptions for public-safety reasons,” said Rosenblatt.
