After an immigrant protection bill was vetoed, lawmakers rewrote it, aiming to get it signed into law. Immigrant advocates say it has been watered down. (Photo by Anne-Marie Caruso/New Jersey Monitor)
When New Jersey lawmakers advanced a bill in January to strengthen protections for immigrants and restrict when local police can work with federal immigration authorities, supporters celebrated it as a necessary step in a fraught political landscape.
But that bill was vetoed by the former governor, forcing lawmakers back to the drawing board. Democrats introduced a new bill, but with a handful of substantial changes that angered immigrant advocates who say New Jersey needs to act to limit the Trump administration’s aggressive deportation effort.
“We’ve watched this administration escalate, and escalate, and escalate. They are going to continue to do so, and if you think this watered-down version of this bill is going to help New Jersey immigrants, you’re wrong,” Katy Sastre of First Friends New Jersey and New York told lawmakers last month, adding that the newer version of the bill creates “giant loopholes for ICE to exploit.”
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The bill is aimed at codifying the state’s 2018 Immigrant Trust Directive, an order from the state attorney general that restricts when local and state police officers can assist federal immigration officers or share information about people in their custody.
Immigrant advocates have been calling for the protections to be written into statute for years, warning that a future administration could unilaterally rescind the order.
A comparison of the two bills shows how it morphed from the January version vetoed by former Gov. Phil Murphy to the February version that supporters hope to get to Gov. Mikie Sherrill’s desk in the next few weeks.
Notice of release
The two bills differ on how New Jersey law enforcement handles migrants who are subject to a final order of removal. That’s a court-ordered determination that someone must leave the country, though it does not mean deportation is imminent, despite the name. Some people under these orders have visas to remain in the U.S. or have other legal protections like Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals and Temporary Protected Status. More than 1 million people who lack legal status have final orders of removal, but remain in the country.
The January bill would have prohibited New Jersey law enforcement from notifying immigration agents of an impending release of a migrant in their custody or holding them past their scheduled release date at an immigration agent’s request.
In the latest bill, police would be able to provide notice of a migrant’s upcoming release from custody or keep them in custody if the detainee is subject to a final order of removal signed by a federal judge.
Charges vs. conviction
The older version of the legislation would have allowed police to alert federal officials about a migrant’s crimes only if they had been convicted of certain violent, serious, or indictable offenses (the list of eligible crimes is extensive, ranging from homicide and domestic violence to criminal mischief and harassment).
Under the new bill, police would be allowed to provide notice to federal authorities if a migrant has been charged with those offenses.
Data sharing
The January bill would have required federal agents to have a valid court order or judicial warrant to obtain information regarding the citizenship or immigration status, lawful or unlawful, of any migrant from local and state police.
The February bill would not require federal agents to have a court order or warrant to get that information.
Resources for feds
Under the January bill, police departments would not have been allowed to give federal authorities access to any state, county, or local law enforcement equipment, office space, facility, database, or property not available to the public. It also barred New Jersey law enforcement from sharing any money appropriated to them with federal immigration authorities.
Under the February bill, the word “facility” is struck from the list of places federal authorities would be barred from accessing. And the language about sharing in any appropriated funds has been removed.
The sponsors of the bill did not respond to requests for comment for this story.
Sherrill, a Democrat, has not commented directly on the bill. While campaigning for governor last year, she said she had some concerns about codifying the directive, suggesting it could open the state up to a new legal challenge. The directive itself has been upheld in court multiple times, including by the U.S. 3rd Circuit Court of Appeals.
Murphy made the same argument when he vetoed the bill, saying that because it added provisions not in the directive, it might not have withstood judicial scrutiny.
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