Michigan Democrats are working to impede U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement in both Lansing and Washington, most recently with a hearing on several bills in the state Senate last week.
On Thursday, the Senate Committee on Civil Rights, Judiciary, and Public Safety, chaired by Sen. Stephanie Chang, D-Detroit, heard testimony on multiple bills aimed at limiting cooperation between state and local entities and federal immigration officials while imposing new constraints on enforcement practices.
Much of the testimony centered on Senate Bills 508, 509, and 510, which would reduce the state’s involvement in federal immigration enforcement in a variety of ways.
The bills would ban arrests in designated “sensitive locations” such as schools and hospitals, ban state agencies from sharing information with federal authorities without a judicial warrant, and jail officers who protect their families from harassment by wearing masks or obscuring their identity.
Supporters who testified likened ICE tactics to those of a secret police force, and alleged that enforcement actions often target individuals who are not violent criminals, including lawful residents, tribal members, and, in some cases, U.S. citizens.
Sen. Jim Runestad, R-White Lake, the lone Republican on the committee, challenged the credibility of the testimony and the direction of the legislation, though his time to speak was repeatedly limited by Chang, who restricted his remarks to one question at a time.
“This is not my first rodeo in the Judiciary Committee,” Runestad told The Midwesterner after the hearing, noting Chang’s restrictions fit a broader pattern of silencing dissent on immigration issues. “It’s been a complete cluster of censorship, packing the audience at the last minute with one side and shutting down all dissent. It’s something out of a show trial from the Soviet Union.”
Michigan House Democrats have also introduced measures to blunt ICE’s operations.
House Bill 5494, sponsored by Rep. Dylan Wegela, D-Garden City, would prohibit the state from selling or transferring state-owned property to ICE or allowing it to be used for immigration detention. House Bill 5495, sponsored by Rep. Carrie Rheingans, D-Ann Arbor, would add new search-and-seizure restrictions that critics argue would limit law enforcement’s ability to cooperate with federal immigration authorities.
These bills, supporters argue, are intended to protect civil liberties, but opponents contend they undermine law enforcement’s ability to enforce federal immigration law.
The effort in Lansing mirrors efforts by Democratic members of Michigan’s congressional delegation, who are actively fighting to decapitate Department of Homeland Security leadership and cut off funding for the department.
Rep. Haley Stevens, D-Birmingham, a vocal critic of ICE, is co-sponsoring H.R. 7163, legislation that would divert up to $75 billion in ICE funding to local law enforcement and community policing programs rather than federal immigration enforcement.
Stevens argues that ICE is “out of control” and that “not one penny more should go to ICE” following fatal shootings involving federal immigration agents and protestors in Minneapolis.
Stevens and her colleagues also called for thorough investigations into deaths of individuals in ICE custody, urging Homeland Security leadership to explain enforcement practices and accountability gaps in federal detention centers.
Rep. Hillary Scholten, D-Grand Rapids, likewise voted against the Department of Homeland Security appropriations bill, citing concerns that it would provide funding to “rogue and unaccountable federal enforcement agents” without sufficient oversight or reforms to ICE’s operations.
Sen. Elissa Slotkin, D-Holly, has also vowed to vote against funding for ICE and the broader Department of Homeland Security without significant reforms, sponsored legislation to unmask federal agents, and impose other restrictions on those carrying out the largest deportation effort in U.S. history.
Sen. Gary Peters, D-Holly, made the same commitment not to vote for additional ICE funding, because he alleges “DHS’ current immigration enforcement operations are not protecting our homeland security or making American communities safter.”
Stevens, along with Reps. Rashida Talib, D-Detroit, and Shri Thanedar, D-Detroit, are calling to impeach DHS Secretary Kristi Noem, while Talib and Thanedar are pushing to abolish ICE entirely.
The bills from the Michigan Senate and House, as well as the federal legislation, remain in committee.
While Michigan Democrats attack ICE, none have bothered to mention or name folks killed by illegal immigrants in Michigan and beyond, and have ignored critical details about attacks on ICE agents that played fatal altercations.
A Department of Homeland Security website detailing the “Worst of the Worst” illegal immigrants nabbed by ICE in Michigan lists at least 156 with prior convictions, from prostituting a minor, to cocaine smuggling, to homicide, negligent manslaughter, lascivious acts with a minor, rape, willful homicide, smuggling aliens, cruelty toward a child, sexual exploitation of a minor, racketeering, sodomy, and dozens of other heinous crimes.
