Montgomery County prohibits its employees from cooperating with ICE, barring legal requirements

From Delco to Chesco and Montco to Bucks, what about life in Philly’s suburbs do you want WHYY News to cover? Let us know!

Montgomery County’s Board of Commissioners announced a policy Wednesday that bars county employees from cooperating with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement when they are not legally required to do so. The protocol is effective immediately.

“It is not the responsibility of the County or its employees to enforce federal immigration law,” the policy reads, while also noting that county employees “should not interfere with or obstruct federal immigration agents conducting enforcement activities.”

The policy is the latest effort by Democratic Commissioners Neil Makhija and Jamila Winder to respond to calls to better protect the rights of immigrant residents amid ongoing ICE raids that have seen dozens of people reportedly detained in the Norristown area alone in recent weeks.

Last week, the Montgomery County Correctional Facility updated its policies to require a judicial warrant in order to detain people on behalf of ICE. Previously, the facility honored detainers as well as judicial warrants to detain people on behalf of ICE for up to four hours after they paid bail and were otherwise free to go.

Under the policy announced Wednesday, county employees are not allowed to share an individual’s name, work or home address, immigration status, country of origin, program participation or appointment schedules to ICE or any federal immigration agency without the county solicitor’s approval.

The county requires a judicial warrant or judicially authorized subpoena before providing any person’s information to federal immigration agents.

“This ensures that we maintain our commitment to the rule of law, to due process and protecting the privacy and dignity of every individual,” Makhija said at Wednesday’s meeting.

The policy outlines a protocol for county employees who are interacting with ICE or other federal immigration officers, requiring them to ask for their information and business cards, as well as  any relevant documents, including warrants, subpoenas or court orders. Employees should then contact their supervisor and give them all relevant paperwork. Supervisors are instructed to contact their department’s solicitor and share information provided by the federal immigration agents as well as all relevant paperwork.

County employees should request information related to any individual’s immigration status only if it is explicitly required by law or necessary for eligibility for a particular program, such as voter registration or state or federal public benefits, according to the policy.

“We’re … making sure that we show members of our immigrant community that we’re here to support them, and at the same time, inform both members of our staff and the community that there are laws in place that will be enforced and we are going to support due process, but the law is what the law is, and unless we change it federally, that’s the position we’re in today,” Makhija said.

In May, Makhija and Winder committed to not collaborating with ICE via 287(g) agreements.

The county also hired Nelly Jiménez-Arévalo as its first ever director of immigrant affairs in February and created an online immigrant resource center in May.

Several speakers at Wednesday’s meeting acknowledged the commissioners’ actions to support the county’s roughly 100,000 immigrant residents, while some continued to ask commissioners to pass a welcoming ordinance and implement other policies, including a municipal ID program, that would be beneficial to immigrant communities.