Hearing took place on controversial state -level requirements for sheriffs to cooperate with ice »Urban Milwaukee

The Republican supporters of a draft law requesting sheriffs to cooperate with ICE say they would make Wisconsin safer, while opponents say that it increases civil rights and would erode the confidence in the law between the members of the migrant communities.

According to the draft law, sheriffs should notify immigration and customs execution if the persons held in county prisons under charges cannot produce citizenship documents, such as an American passport, a notarized birth certificate or a visa. Also, the departments would be obliged to hold people in prison, even for lower taxes, if ICE sends a detainees. If the sheriffs do not comply, the common income funds of their counties would be reduced by 15 %.

During a public hearing on Wednesday before the Committee of State Assembly for Criminal Justice and Public Safety, senator state-author of the senator draft Julian BradleyR-New Berlin, said the legislation is focused on facilitating the elimination of dangerous criminals from Wisconsin communities.

“It is shocking to believe that a handful of law and our government would prefer to protect crimes than work with our federal partners to stop the flow of crime and drugs in our neighborhoods,” Bradley said.

He and other Republicans at hearing called sheriffs Milwaukee and berths counties for the conclusion of cooperation agreements with ICE.

When the bill has been entered At the beginning of February, the sheriff of Dane County Kalvin Barrett He issued a statement saying that the draft law “undermines the local authority and could have serious consequences for applying the efficient law”.

“It is not the role of the state legislator to dictate how the law enforcement does their job,” Barrett said. “Public safety decisions should be made by those who understand the police complexities and the unique needs of our communities.”

Assembly speaker Robin VosR-Rochester, another co-author of the draft law, again gave the statements that the draft law is an example of the Wisconsin Legislature that wear local control with an unfounded mandate. He said that running the name of a detainee through a database will not load the departments of the sheriff.

As for the threatening counties with a loss of state funds, VOS quoted a shared income agreement adopted in 2023, which increased local aid as it required at the same time Milwaukee public schools to bring back the school resources officers starting January 1. The deputies missed the deadline and a judge of Milwaukee County ordered the district to comply until Thursday. Vos said that he did not include a punishment in the invoice of the common income “was a mistake”.

“This should be a wide, bipartid invoice and, if you do not want to apply it, there must be a penalty,” said VOS. “So I would hope that I would forget and say that the goal is to have no one to have a punishment. That should never happen if you respect the law. “

American Union for Wisconsin Civil Liberties Advocacy director Amanda Merkwae He confessed that the draft law obliges the local officers to apply the law to become “mass deporting tools under the threat of loss of common income for essential county services.”

While Republican parliamentarians reiterated that the draft law is focused on charged detainees committed crimes, Merkwae said he would ask sheriffs to hold “anyone in prison for 48 hours” after they had to be released if ICE requests a detainee “regardless of crime, they are charged”.

Along with the lawyers of immigration at hearing, Merkwae mentioned concerns about civil rights violations. She said that the news about the legislation would sow mistrust to the application of the law in migrant communities.

“Finally, by eliminating the discretion of the sheriffs, this draft law undermines the safety of the community by reducing the confidence in the application of the law and only of anyone can be assumed to be foreign,” said Merkwae. “The safety of all, including citizens, is endangered when victims and witnesses do not feel safe before critical information about the offenses committed.”

The draft law is supported by the sheriffs in Wisconsin and by the Deputy Sheriff’s Association and the Badger State Sheriff’s Association, although the groups issued a common letter For the parliamentarians who state: “We strongly believe that the application of immigration is fundamentally a federal problem that should be addressed at the federal level.” He continued, saying that the reporting requirements in the draft law could “place” the departments with limited personnel.

“In addition, we are concerned about the financial implications of the provisions of shared income penalties, which could have unwanted consequences for the county budgets and, finally, the local public safety efforts,” the letter shows.

The ICE law is opposite by groups like ACLU from Wisconsin, Wisconsin County Association and The Wisconsin Education Association Council.

Democratic governor Tony evers promised to see the legislation.

Listen to the WPR report

Bill asking sheriffs to cooperate with ICE receive public hearing was initially published by Wisconsin Public Radio.