Cities cut immigrant detention contracts as protests intensify

EL PASO, Texas — In Texas, officials near Austin terminated a contract with Immigration and Customs Enforcement to detain dozens of migrant mothers who had been arrested and separated from their children. In California, Sacramento County ended a multimillion-dollar deal with ICE to keep immigrants jailed while awaiting hearings.

The City Council of Springfield in western Oregon voted unanimously to end yet another contract with ICE for housing immigrants in the municipal jail. And in Alexandria, Va., authorities put an end to a deal allowing ICE to house immigrant children in a juvenile detention center.

Local governments throughout the United States are starting to sever lucrative ties with federal immigration entities amid growing discomfort with the Trump administration’s immigration policies. Fueled largely by alarm over the separation of migrant children from their parents, the cancellations suggest an attempt to disengage from federal policies seen as harmful to immigrant families — even when those policies could be pouring millions of dollars into local government budgets.

“It just felt inherently unjust for Sacramento to make money from dealing with ICE,” said Phil Serna, a Sacramento County supervisor who joined two colleagues in canceling the contract. “For me, it came down to an administration that is extremely hostile to immigrants. I didn’t feel we should be part of that.”

The local debates over what to do with ICE facilities come at a time when federal