New Jersey and Seattle Take Further Steps Toward Open State Insurrection

Minnesota and other blue states and cities have thus far followed a two-pronged approach toward making it harder for the federal government to enforce immigration law. The first prong: State and local government officials thwart enforcement through denial of state cooperation. This includes not deploying local police trained in crowd control, such that ICE agents have to interact directly with aggressive and obstructive protesters, with the results that we have seen in Minneapolis. The second prong has been escalating rhetoric, by which state and city officials try to whip up private obstruction. This includes portraying the presence of federal agents as an “invasion” and entire agencies as the equivalent of the Gestapo.

In spite of Tim Walz’s musings about deploying the National Guard for combat against federal authorities, however, state and local Democrats have mostly been careful not to cross the line into deploying taxpayer resources into actively obstructing deportations. Newly elected New Jersey Governor Mikie Sherrill — governor of the only state above the Mason-Dixon Line to vote against Abraham Lincoln in 1864 — told The Daily Show that she plans to set up a government hotline for New Jersey residents to report the presence and movements of federal agents:

We’re not going to allow any ICE raids to be staged from state properties. And we are also going to be standing up a portal so people can upload all their cell phone videos and alert people — like, if you see an ICE agent in the street, get your phone out. [Emphasis added.]

Just imagine if, say, Greg Abbott announced that he was asking Texans to track every movement of Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms agents, or if Greg Gianforte told Montanans to report any IRS agent they saw to the state. It’s the anti-terrorism “if you see something, say something” slogan redirected against the Department of Homeland Security.

Seattle Mayor Katie Wilson plans to go even further:

• Require the Seattle Police Department to investigate, verify, and document any reports of immigration enforcement activity. If dispatched to a location where apparent immigration enforcement activity is underway, officers will document the activity with in-car and body-worn video, validate the status of apparent federal law enforcement agents through official identification, and secure scenes of potentially unlawful acts to gather evidence for transmittal to prosecutors.

• Mandate close cooperation between city departments and community organizations to ensure everyone has the latest and most accurate information about federal enforcement activities. In particular, this information will be shared with a hotline operated by our trusted community-led organizational partner where concerned community members can be connected to support, resources, and information in response to immigration enforcement activity.

• Issue an executive order immediately prohibiting civil federal immigration authorities from using property that is both City-owned and City controlled for civil immigration enforcement activities, including City parks, parking lots, plazas, vacant lots, storage facilities, garages, and the Seattle Center. The mayor urges the Seattle School District, Seattle Municipal Court, and other local government bodies to take similar action.

• Establish the Stand Together Seattle Initiative, which invites private property owners to post notice clarifying that their property may not be accessed by federal agents without a warrant.

• Quickly invest $4 million in city funds to organizations engaged in immigrant legal defense, community support, and the long-term needs of immigrant communities. This money was appropriated by City Council late last year, and we are working to quickly invest the funds.

Add this to Philadelphia district attorney Larry Krasner vowing — with the aid of prosecutors in Austin and Dallas, Texas; Tuscon, Ariz.; and Norfolk, Falls Church, Fairfax, and Portsmouth, Va. — to ICE agents: “If we have to hunt you down the way they hunted down Nazis for decades, we will find your identities. We will find you.”

This is effectively a declaration that federal authority will be treated as foreign and hostile in these jurisdictions, with the goal of helping people break the law and get away with it. It will not end well.