New Hampshire is the only state in the Northeast other than Maine that is NOT a Sanctuary State, but it did not strictly prohibit towns or cities from pretending they were. This amounted to local political pressure to dissuade peace officers from assisting federal immigration enforcement, particularly with detention retainers.
In practice, this produces two results, neither of which has any particular value. First, local law enforcement can’t legally stop the feds; they can do nothing and stay out of the way or get detained themselves for obstruction. Second, advocates burnish their political resumes with another empty promise with real fiscal consequences. Schools forced to teach kids speaking a dozen languages or more don’t teach anyone anything, but they still spend more money than the rest of local government combined, often times two. There are other examples, but you get the idea. Sanctuary status attracts bodies the way generous welfare states gather homeless populations.
HB511, “relative to cooperation with federal immigration authorities,” (emphasis added).
I. Requires law enforcement agencies to comply with immigration detainers of inmates if safe to do so and prohibits state and local government entities from adopting sanctuary policies to prohibit or impede the enforcement of federal immigration law.
II. Prohibits New Hampshire law enforcement agencies from investigating an inmate’s citizenship status unless subsequent to an alleged violation of New Hampshire law or pursuant to anauthorization by law.
III. Prohibits blanket policies against compliance with immigration detainers for inmates and prohibits any government entity or law enforcement agency from restricting the use and transmission of inmate immigration information used in compliance with the chapter
It is called the Anti-Sanctuary Act because local law enforcement is prohibited from activities typically associated with Sanctuary Status.
“Sanctuary policy” means a law, policy, practice, procedure, or custom adopted or allowed by a state entity or local governmental entity which prohibits or impedes a law enforcement agency from complying with 8 U.S.C. section 1373 or which prohibits or impedes a law enforcement agency from communicating or cooperating with a federal immigration agency so as to limit such law enforcement agency in, or prohibit the agency from:
(a) Complying with an immigration detainer;
(b) Complying with a request from a federal immigration agency to notify the agency before the release of an inmate or detainee in the custody of the law enforcement agency;
(c) Providing a federal immigration agency access to an inmate for interview;
(d) Participating in any program or agreement authorized under section 287 of the Immigration and Nationality Act, 8 U.S.C. section 1357; or
(e) Providing a federal immigration agency with an inmate’s incarceration status or release date.
My only complaint is the enforcement portion of the statute. Like many a bill in the Granite State, it lacks teeth.
“Any executive or administrative state, county, or municipal officer who violates his or her duties under this chapter may be subject to action by the attorney general.”
A lazy AG, beholden to the political insiders or one appointed by some future Democrat governor, can ignore the law at their discretion. Given our long history of this sort of behavior going back at least as far as Attorney General Ayotte (under Governors Benson and Lynch), virtue signalers looking to up their progressive street cred can openly flout the law, assuming Governor Ayotte signs it, with little fear of consequence at the state level.
They may want to wait a few years to consider it. Trump’s DOJ, FBI, and CBP have zero tolerance for “protesters” who break the law. Your arrest is likely, and not just for a photo op. This isn’t the German police escorting Greta Thunberg before cameras to get her face in the paper. Obstruction and trespass are being enforced.
Otherwise, feel free to bark at the moon or scream in the darkness to impress your base. If the Feds change their minds, the NH law won’t be worth much more than the paper on which it is written. A problem I can only assume they hope to amend in future legislative sessions.
Despite my complaints, I have no objection to incremental improvement. The Democrats do it to great effect even when their base wants the whole enchilada (mmmm, enchiladas) on the first pass, and this is certainly a good bit of that. And Republicans want that too, but get mighty upset with half-measures.
I’m okay with HB511 despite the poor enforcement language. It marks new territory even if it ought to have been a foregone conclusion. Federal law has supremacy, assuming it is enforced. HB511 simply reminds the locals that this is required, and you are not allowed to enact ordinances contrary to that.
Take the points. It was hard to get them.
