Judge strikes deportation policy

MIAMI — Faced with threats by President Trump to cut off federal funding, Miami-Dade County violated the U.S. Constitution when it agreed to jail people slated for deportation, a judge ruled Friday.

The judge’s ruling was a rebuke of Miami-Dade Mayor Carlos Gimenez’s much-criticized decision to allow county jails to hold immigrants awaiting deportation by federal agents, a measure that has sparked anger by many immigration advocates in South Florida.

Circuit Judge Milton Hirsch wrote that the policy violated the 10th Amendment, which limits the reach of the federal government over states.

“Of course we must protect our country from the problems associated with unregulated immigration,” Hirsch wrote. “We must protect our country from a great many things; but from nothing so much as from the loss of our historic rights and liberties.”

The county immediately filed a notice of appeal of the ruling. A spokesman for the mayor said immigration is a federal issue that should be handled in federal court.

Since 2013, Miami-Dade County had stopped honoring most requests by federal authorities to hold undocumented or deportable jail inmates, even though their sentences were up or their cases closed. County officials expressed concern because the feds were not reimbursing the cost of detaining.

But when Trump took office in January, he threatened to cut federal funding from sanctuary cities that did not cooperate with federal immigration authorities. Gimenez ordered the county jail system to honor all requests by immigration authorities.