Photo, above: Chris Farley in drag? Nah, that’s Sally Hernandez, Sheriff of Travis County, Texas, home to Austin, a sanctuary city that has been thumbing its nose to President Trump’s get-tough policy on illegal immigration.
Texas Governor Greg Abbott is shortly signing legislation authorizing jail time to public officials who openly violate federal law by refusing to enforce it.
Travis County Sheriff Sally Hernandez has blatantly refused to cooperate with ICE and other federal authorities trying to do their jobs, apprehending and deporting illegal immigrants.
So, in retribution ICE is upping its game in Austin, increasing its presence and activity apprehending and deporting illegals. Thus, this sanctuary policy is blowing up in Sheriff Hernandez’s face like prank cigar.
ICE: ‘You won’t turn over ten illegals in your jail to us? No problem, we will allocate additional resources to our activity in Austin and apprehend five times that amount without your help.’
From Yahoo News
Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) deliberately targeted Austin, Texas after talks between the agency’s officials and local authorities went awry, U.S. Magistrate Judge Andrew Austin said during a public court session Tuesday. Immigration officials reported at least 50 people were arrested in Austin – typically described as a sanctuary city for its welcoming stance on immigration – early last month after a federal crackdown began following President Donald Trump’s inauguration.
The raids began after Travis County Sheriff Sally Hernandez met with an ICE field office director to discuss the federal government’s new immigration guidelines under Trump.
Instead of working with federal agencies to comply with an increase in immigrant detentions and deportations nationwide, Hernandez created a policy limiting the cooperation between local law enforcement and immigration officials.
The ICE Homeland Security Investigations agents detained a woman at Danny’s Family Car Wash in Phoenix, Arizona, Aug. 17, 2013.
Photo: ReutersThe judge said he was warned by immigration officials that the city “could expect a big operation, agents coming in from out of town” that was “a result of the sheriff’s new policy, that this was going to happen” when questioning ICE agent Laron Bryant Tuesday.
“That’s the one we heard about where 50-some-odd people were arrested,” Judge Austin said. “My understanding is, what was told us is, one of the reasons that [the raid] happened is because the meetings that had occurred between the field office director and the sheriff didn’t go very well.”
The Trump administration ramped up raids detaining undocumented immigrants across the country beginning in late-January, as Attorney General Jeff Sessions warned action would be taken against sanctuary cities and other locales which fail to comply with new Department of Homeland Security guidelines. The federal government can legally step in and detain unauthorized aliens in states and cities where local officials aren’t as well as strip funding from sanctuary cities, Sessions warned Tuesday.
“Fundamentally, we intend to use all the lawful authority we have to make sure that our state and local officials, who are so important to law enforcement, are in sync with the federal government,” Sessions said to reporters Tuesday. “Countless Americans would be alive today and countless loved ones would not be grieving today if these policies of sanctuary cities were ended.”
