Claiming that their bills do not conflict with federal or state immigration statutes, Metro Council members Colby Sledge and Bob Mendes have introduced two sanctuary city bills that will help shield criminal and non-criminal illegal aliens in Nashville. The Tennessee Immigrant & Refugee Rights Coalition (TIRRC), whose co-director Lindsey Harris is married to Sledge, helped draft the bills.
Shortly after President Trump issued his Executive Order calling for appropriate enforcement of U.S. immigration laws, TIRRC issued a state-wide call to organize against efforts by U.S. Immigration & Customs Enforcement to follow the President’s orders:
Last week the president shared his blueprints for mass deportation and made clear he needs state and local agencies to act as his deportation force. Join with TIRRC members in your local area to stop your city/county from collaborating with ICE and to create communities of trust where all residents feel safe. Sign up here: www.tnimmigrant.org/trust .
The Mendes/Sledge bills are scheduled for a first reading on June 6.
Mendes’ website claims that his bills “would not create ‘sanctuary city’ status” even though the bills are designed to obstruct and possibly prohibit cooperating with ICE detainer requests, which the Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR) says are “[o]ne of the more recent and pervasive forms of sanctuary policies…Detainers are used to request that state and local law enforcement either notify ICE that it is about to release a criminal alien or to maintain custody of the alien for up to 48-hours for ICE pick-up.”
One of the Mendes/Sledge bills parrots efforts by other sanctuary cities to require a judicial warrant as opposed to ICE’s administrative warrant in order to comply with an ICE detainer request, a tactic intended to slow down deportations. Revised 2017 ICE policies reflected in the new detainer forms now require that the basis for probable cause that the person to be detained is subject to deportation, is set forth in the paperwork and the arrest warrant is also provided.
Another section of the bill goes as far as possible to assist aliens in concealing their illegal immigration status and enable them to pass for legal residents:
A department, board, commission, officer, or employee of the metropolitan government of Nashville and Davidson County, including law enforcement officers, shall not request information about or otherwise assist in the investigation of the citizenship or immigration status of any person, unless otherwise required by federal or state law or by court order.
Before leaving office, Obama’s Attorney General Loretta Lynch issued guidance that city officials must be in compliance with 8 U.S.C. 1373 which:
prevents federal, state and local government entities and officials from ‘prohibit[ing] or in any way restrict[ing]’ government officials or entities from sending to, or receiving from, federal immigration officers information concerning an individual’s citizenship or immigration status.
In addition, Tennessee law requires that the citizenship status of anyone who is arrested, booked, or confined for any period in a county or municipal jail or detention facility, be verified and that illegal aliens or anyone whose immigration status cannot be determined, be reported to ICE.
Mendes says he has a “moral obligation to make the city safe for everyone” and TIRRC wants “communities of trust.” Both statements viewed in the context of TIRRC’s ideological stance on illegal immigration and the text of the Mendes/Sledge bills, put protecting criminal aliens over and above the interests and welfare of citizens and legally admitted immigrants. Sheriffs from around the country have said that sanctuary policies do not create more trusting and cooperative relationships between illegal aliens and law enforcement.
TIRRC is organizing support for passage of the bills. Mayor Megan Barry’s campaign theme, “it doesn’t matter where you started life or how you got here” understood as urging legal immigration like refugee resettlement and illegal immigration to continue in Nashville, signals that there is little doubt that her pen will be ready to sign the bills into Metro’s code.
[…] amendment to the 2010 bill requiring local jailers to communicate with ICE. This bill became highly relevant when the Metro Nashville Council tried pass a sanctuary city ordinance this […]
[…] and Sledge object to cooperating with federal authorities working to deport criminal aliens and appear to have internalized Mayor Megan Barry’s mantra that Nashville is and should […]
[…] Mendes/Sledge bills are specifically intended to obstruct cooperation with federal authorities working to enforce immigration laws, which is the essential element that […]
[…] & Refugee Rights Coalition (TIRRC) which has helped two Metro Nashville council members draft bills to prevent ICE from removing criminal aliens from Davidson […]
[…] Sledge is married to TIRRC’s co-director Lindsey Harris. […]
Cities; Concentrations of idiots who elect criminals to government. Cain built the 1st. Cancers on the face of God’s green earth, blue ones are malignant. Killing US!
So you guys don’t have the balls to call it what it is – a sanctuary city bill. And the mayor? She won’t cop to it either. Afraid of losing votes from the Conexion Americas cartel? Why don’t you just go all Jerry Brown and Rahm Emmanuel ( your heroes it seems) and tell the truth for once.
You are all traitors to our country and this state and this city, putting those who have broken the law ahead of law abiding, hard working citizens.
You are playing with fire and you have no idea what forces you will unleash. You’re Saul Alinskyites, self righteous progressive socialists who think you know best how our big town should become a big city like Chicago? – the only city in the U.S. that is losing population – – Chicago, home to Alinsky, birthplace of Alinsky follower Hilary Clinton – Chicago, the city that launched Socialist Barak Obama (a community organizer using Alinsky tactics) to fame and fortune and wealthy elitist Weatherman terrorist Bill Ayers – Chicago, known all over the world for its high murder rate – Chicago, a great example of a sanctuary city. Is that the direction you want us to go?
Now our home grown socialist couple and their thoroughly Chicago-ized lawyer friend want to make sure that the life and security of Nashvillians is endangered by Hispanic criminals like members of the MS13 and other gangs and the “hate whitey who stole our land” and flaunt our laws and spit-in-our-food La Raza types. And let’s not forget the diseases that they bring in like pneumonia that can’t doesn’t respond to antibiotics, mumps, polio and hepatitis. That’s all good, right, Colby and Bob?
And you want us to welcome with open arms Islamic jhadi cells who’ve slithered across the border to lie low and wait to bomb and maim and murder our kids at music festivals and concerts when we least expect it.. Right, guys? Am I getting what you want to do?
Yes, sir, kids, work hard on passing your bill. It’ll make those legal immigrants who came and obeyed our laws feel just grand about being put at the back of the bus.
Oh yeah, one more thing. If the bill passes, who’s going to pay the bill for all the illegals who will flock here when they find we’re the newest softies to take advantage of and suck at the trough of our tax dollars?