New York City

NY Attorney General vows to protect state laws limiting federal immigration enforcement

January 23, 2025 Brooklyn Eagle Staff
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ALBANY — RESPONDING TO A Trump administration Immigration Enforcement Memorandum sent to Department of Justice staff, New York Attorney General Letitia James has held firm to upholding state laws “that protect immigrants and limit cooperation with federal immigration enforcement efforts.”

The federal Justice Department on Wednesday, directed its prosecutors to investigate any state or local officials who obstruct beefed-up enforcement of immigration laws under the Trump administration, according to a memo to its entire workforce that the Associated Press obtained. The NYPD, among other local law enforcement agencies, prohibits officers from “assist[ing] in any manner with civil immigration enforcement.”

Attorney General James, who also issued local law enforcement an updated guidance from 2017, pointed out the U.S. Constitution’s 10th Amendment, stating that “powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.”

This clause, she explained, “limits the federal government’s ability to mandate particular action by states and localities, including in the area of federal immigration law enforcement and investigations. The federal government cannot ‘compel the States to enact or administer a federal regulatory program’ or compel state employees to participate in the administration of a federally enacted regulatory scheme.”

“New York will not be bullied into breaking the law in order to fulfill a campaign promise. We will not sit idly by and allow the Constitution to be undermined,” said Attorney General James.

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