3 hours ago
1
The Justice Department has found a workaround to bypass sanctuary city laws and force local authorities to help with President Trump’s deportation crackdown — charge illegal migrants with federal crimes for entering the US illegally.
The Department of Justice and Immigration and Customs Enforcement have been working “around the clock” to slap as many migrants as they can, sources tell The Post.
So far, more than 15,000 such cases have been filed since President Trump’s inauguration, according to the DOJ.
The criminal charges escalate the cases from a civil immigration issue to a federal criminal one — allowing ICE agents to enter jails of sanctuary jurisdictions like New York City to pick up illegal migrants.
A DOJ source told The Post the new administration has been “pushing” US attorneys “to get creative” on the warrants “since day one” and to push them “in sanctuary jurisdictions” that pose “significant risks to public safety.”
It’s not clear whether the tactic has been deployed in New York City, but the US Attorney offices in other parts of New York state are already using it.
Targets of the effort include Guatemalan citizen Wilson Oswaldo Galvan-Lope, 25, who was charged by the US Attorney in the Western District of New York last month with illegal reentry, after he entered the country illegally and ended up in Rochester after getting deported once before.
Two others, Israel De La Cruz San Juan, 29, and Candido De La Cruz San Juan, 34, both of whom hail from Mexico, were collared last month and hit with the same charges after they were stopped in Tonawanda, New York, driving a truck full of construction equipment with expired registration.
Israel was originally deported in 2017, while Candido was kicked out in both 2012 and 2013.
Their charges carry a maximum sentence of up to two years in prison and a $250,000 fine.
Such federal criminal warrants are almost universally recognized, allowing ICE agents to enter jails without violating local sanctuary laws.
New York City’s sanctuary laws offer the carveouts for criminal charges signed off by a federal magistrate judge.
This strategy represents the Trump administration “calling the bluff of sanctuary jurisdictions,” said Andrew Arthur, a legal expert with the Center for Immigration Studies.
Local cops can, however, choose to not play ball, but that’s rare for federal criminal warrants, sources said.
“They will almost always honor those warrants. Because if you’re a state or locality, you don’t wanna get in bad with the federal judge,” said Arthur.
“They’re playing with fire if they ignore a federal judicial warrant,” he added.
And the effort is happening all day and night.
ICE sources say they’re getting calls from the US attorney’s offices at all hours to provide sworn statements for a judge to sign off on each warrant as quickly as possible.
“The assistant US attorneys are messaging me at 1 a.m., these guys are working around the clock,” said an ICE source, adding, “It’s busy, that’s for sure.”
Previously, ICE heavily relied on civil immigration detainers to arrest illegal migrants, which aren’t honored by sanctuary jurisdictions.
The DOJ under Trump has formed the “Sanctuary Cities Enforcement Working Group” to pursue legal action against local governments for “violating” or “impeding” federal immigration law.
Trump administration officials took swipes at the Tompkins County Sheriff’s Office in upstate New York in January for cutting loose a “violent” illegal Mexican immigrant convicted of assault even though he had a federal arrest warrant, forcing the feds to nab him off the streets.
The DOJ was reviewing the incident “for potential prosecution” at the time, acting Deputy Attorney General Emil Bove fumed in a statement.
English (US)