City panel backs immigrant-friendly policy
Resolution designed to protect residents’ personal information, regardless of status, moves forward
Even as the Trump administration says a majority of the estimated 11 million undocumented immigrants in the nation are subject to deportation, Santa Fe continues to send a different message to the immigrant community.
The city Public Safety Committee, an advisory group, on Tuesday approved a resolution reaffirming Santa Fe’s 1999 stance that it won’t use city resources to identify and apprehend undocumented immigrants.
The resolution, sponsored by Councilors Renee Villarreal and Joseph Maestas, still has to be approved by the full City Council. It includes policies designed to “safeguard residents’ sensitive personal information and preserve residents’ human and civil rights.” It calls for keeping a person’s immigration status confidential “except as required by law” and refusing federal immigration agents access to city-owned property to enforce immigration laws.
The committee’s approval of the resolution came on the same day U.S. Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly issued two sets of sweeping policies to implement President Donald Trump’s executive orders on immigration.
The two memos say Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers, who work for the Department of Homeland Security, should go after undocumented immigrants convicted of or charged with a criminal offense. If ICE comes across an undocumented immigrant during an operation, agents should apprehend that person, the memos direct.
They also say the administration will expand a federal program that deputizes local police officers to work as immigration agents, and they direct the federal government to hire 10,000 additional ICE officers and 5,000 Border Patrol agents to carry out the policies. However, Homeland Security officials said that young immigrants temporarily protected from deportation under a 2012 Obama administration program known as Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals would not be targeted as long as they don’t commit crimes.
César Cuauhtémoc García Hernández, an immigration law professor at the University of Denver’s Sturm College of Law, said Trump’s approach is more strict than the approach of President Barack Obama, who was dubbed the “deporter in chief ” by immigrant advocates for deporting nearly 3 million immigrants during his two terms in office — more than any other previous administration.
“The president has expanded the priority targets. Now, everybody is potentially removable and a priority,” García Hernández said. “The president shows that they are not taking a nuanced approach to the immigrant community.”
Local practices challenging the Trump administration, such as the resolution in Santa Fe intended to assure immigrants they are welcome here, could compel the administration to enforce its immigration policies in those cities, García Hernández said.
During Tuesday’s Public Safety Committee meeting, a church leader, a crime victim advocate, a lawyer and former Santa Fe Mayor David Coss said Villarreal and Maestas’ resolution will improve public safety in the city because it will encourage immigrants, even those who don’t have legal residency status, to cooperate with the police department. No one spoke against the measure. Santa Fe Police Chief Patrick Gallagher hasn’t explicitly supported the resolution, but during Tuesday’s meeting, he said his department will do what the council and city residents want it to do.
Chris Rivera, the only city councilor on the five-member advisory committee, said he initially had concerns about the resolution because of Trump’s proposal to cut federal funding from so-called sanctuary cities.
“I hope we’re not in the position down the road that we regret bringing this attention to us,” he said.
With or without the help of local law enforcement agencies, ICE has been arresting undocumented immigrants across New Mexico. Last week, agents arrested a man in Las Cruces at a mobile home park, and federal court records show that ICE officials took at least two men into custody last month who had pending court cases in Santa Fe.
Carlos Roberto Navarrete, 31, had been arrested by Santa Fe police in late December on suspicion of burglarizing a downtown bike shop. Jairo Tena-Tena, 30, had been arrested by Santa Fe police on suspicion of shoplifting at a local Wal-Mart. He also was charged with leaving his children unattended at home and possession of a controlled substance.
On Friday, ICE agents arrested Jose Fonseca-Ornelas at a probation office in Rio Rancho, according to a criminal complaint filed in a federal court in Albuquerque. The complaint says Fonseca-Ornelas, who is charged with illegal reentry, was deported to Mexico in 2008.
In another case Thursday in Albuquerque, agents arrested Julian Madrid-- Quezada during what the agency described as a “targeted enforcement action.” The criminal complaint filed in federal court says Madrid-Quezada, who had been deported to Mexico in 2000, was convicted of his sixth DWI in 2006.
The day before that case, agents arrested Rocio Lopez at her job at Comfort Inn and Suites in Albuquerque. Her criminal complaint says she was deported twice in 2001.
While illegal immigration from Mexico has dropped over the past decade, thousands of Central Americans who are seeking asylum from gang-related violence have been apprehended by immigration officials at the border.