The ICE Issue: What Is the Responsibility of State and Local Police?

This article first appeared in New English Review.

The recent events in Minneapolis, which have followed similar events in places like Chicago and other cities, highlight a breakdown in the system when it comes to the relationship between federal agents and state and local police. We have had situations in which the governors of  Illinois and Minnesota, among others, as well as the mayors of Chicago and Minneapolis, again, among others, have openly condemned ICE operations in arresting illegal aliens, even those identified as dangerous criminals. As a result, the police departments of those cities have come under fire for not securing their streets and maintaining public safety. So, just what are the duties and responsibilities of any municipal police force in the face of ICE operations?

The political leaders are arguing that it is not the job of state and local police to enforce federal immigration laws. This is true. It is also true that the federal government is not asking them to- except for notifying ICE when they have an illegal alien in their custody-which the Democratic politicians in so-called sanctuary cities forbid them to do. That in itself is outrageous. When I was in DEA, and we arrested a non-citizen for drug trafficking who was in the country illegally, notifying Immigration was one of the first things we did. When I was working in Los Angeles from 1978-1982, we had an Immigration agent assigned to our task force. He was usually present when we made the arrests. And it did not matter who the mayor of the city or the president of the US was at the time. It was our policy.

That aside, here is what the local city police forces must do-no matter what they or their political leadership think of the ICE operations. They still have a duty to maintain safe streets, and it is they who are responsible for crowd control. ICE agents are not trained in crowd control. If there is an ICE operation, and these well-organized mobs show up to interfere and attack federal agents, that’s where the local police come in. That is what they are trained to do, and that is part of their sworn duty. Moreover, if federal agents of any agency find themselves under attack or faced with a situation they cannot themselves control, calling in police backup is the normal procedure, at least it was back in my days. And when your fellow law enforcement brothers and sisters are putting out a call for help, you don’t stand down. You respond. I guarantee you, if an off-duty federal agent is driving down the street and sees a uniformed cop needing assistance in a dangerous situation, he or she will stop and render assistance. It is part of our culture.

Or at least it used to be. In the recent case in Chicago, when ICE agents found themselves surrounded by a hostile mob, and they called Chicago PD for assistance, the responding officers were ordered to stand down by their watch supervisor. Shame.

Now we have Minneapolis, where both Governor Tim Walz and Mayor Jacob Frey are openly inciting resistance by their local population (not to mention the outside agitators). Not only are they putting ICE agents’ lives in danger, but everybody else’s as well, including those of their own officers if and when they decide to take action. 

In an ideal Minnesota, ICE would notify the MPD that they will be operating in a certain area at a certain time. That way, if citizens start calling the police that there is trouble at such and such a location, the MPD would know what was going on and be prepared to respond if things get out of hand, because that would be their responsibility-to make sure the streets are safe.

But when the local police, in any city, abrogate their duty to engage in crowd control and secure the streets, you have scenes like we see right now in Minneapolis, ICE agents, untrained in crowd control, having to physically defend themselves with whatever they have on hand, and the optics are not pretty. 

I truly believe that the cops on the beat, whether they agree with ICE’s actions or not, are not happy with the policies they are told to follow by their political leadership. And to think that fools like Governor Walz are even implying that they would use their own law enforcement forces to stop ICE is simply the height of irresponsibility.

We depend on our law enforcement agencies at every level to coordinate together and come to each other’s assistance in emergency situations.  The last thing we need is a situation where two law enforcement entities are facing off against each other. If it ever comes down to that, this country is in serious trouble.