Welch: “This is about protecting the right of local communities to protect local communities.”   

WASHINGTON, D.C. — Today, U.S. Senator Peter Welch (D-Vt.), Ranking Member of the Judiciary Subcommittee on the Constitution, pushed back on the false narrative that “sanctuary city” policies impede on local law enforcement and jeopardize public safety during a subcommittee hearing titled: Protecting American Citizenship II: Federalism, Sanctuary Cities, and the Rule of Law. In his remarks, Senator Welch emphasized that the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) have impeded state and local law enforcement from directing their own personnel and resources towards the issues their communities care about most. 

“The assertion here is that the state and local law enforcement should be assisting in the immigration policy of the President, led by Stephen Miller. And that includes, right now, an approach towards mass round-ups. That assertion is wrong. Our local law enforcement agencies have an extraordinary responsibility to protect the citizens in the communities they serve. They are not there to be an adjunct to implement a policy of the president, particularly as to mass deportation,” said Ranking Member Welch. “This is wrong, and it doesn’t make us more safe. In fact, it’s creating difficulties for local law enforcement to meet their obligations to their own citizens. Our communities around the country are reeling from the harm of that, which is from my point of view—what we saw in Minneapolis—a rampage.”   

Ranking Member Welch continued: “Local law enforcement has an obligation for local public safety. Their job is not to be an adjunct to ICE. That’s not their job, and it’s particularly difficult when we have an ICE that time and time again has overreached; has exceeded its authority; has acted in a way that demonstrates the lack of training.”   

Read Senator Welch’s full opening remarks as delivered here and watch his full opening remarks here. 

Witnesses for the Minority included Durham County, North Carolina Sheriff Clarence Birkhead and the Georgetown University Law Center Agnes Williams Sesquicentennial Professor of Federal Courts Stephen Vladeck. 

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