Connecticut Governor Dannel Malloy told a group of refugees, Jewish and Muslim community leaders and elected officials on Tuesday that places that don’t use local police to enforce federal immigration laws should not be called “sanctuary cities” and that there is no such thing as a sanctuary city in legal terms.
According to Yale Law Professor Muneer Ahmad, a sanctuary city describes a lot of policies that stop local police from acting like federal immigration officers. However, “They’re not identical even across cities in the same state, much less across cities in different parts of the country.”
Malloy says, “It’s a term that’s been made up, really made up by folks who want to condemn those communities as opposed to support them.”
Police departments in New Haven and Hartford have been called sanctuary cities because they do not ask people for immigration status and do not detain people on behalf of federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement. Malloy says Trump’s comments that he may take action to deport nearly two million undocumented immigrants would have to be executed by federal immigration agents.
“I think Connecticut is honoring its commitments, but we’re also saying to the federal government, if you desire to take actions, you should take those actions, but don’t depend on us to take those actions on your behalf.”
President-elect Donald Trump has said so-called sanctuary cities should lose federal funding. Malloy said he would sue if a federal policy tried to strip funding from cities in Connecticut.
