No. of Recommendations: 14
How on earth does a sanctuary city justify releasing criminal aliens right back on to the streets of their cities?
Initially, for the same reason we justify releasing criminal native-born people right back onto the streets of their cities. Either because they do not qualify for pre-trial detention (ie. they have been accused of a crime but not yet convicted) or because they have finished their sentences. IOW, there is no state law reason to hold them any further.
Now, there is a counter-argument to this: although the local LEO's no longer have a state law reason to hold these folks, they are (or can be) aware that there may be a federal reason for detaining them based on their immigration status. State government (which includes municipal government in this context) cannot be forced to enforce a federal rule - but they can certainly choose to.
The main reason that sanctuary cities or states choose not to voluntarily do that is because they don't want to discourage people in the communities that have a non-trivial number of people here illegally to stop using the police. A lot of your residents will be more loathe to call the police to report most non-critical crimes (theft and property damage, a drunken bar fight, etc.) if it makes it likely that it will resort in someone being deported, rather than getting a modest criminal penalty. Those who are victims of crimes will also stop reporting as much, because a police department that cooperates with ICE is not likely to be one that a victim can count on not to turn them over.
So if the local police are willing to voluntarily assume the function of helping ICE discover and deport people here unlawfully, then portions of the community will reduce interacting with the police. If a large-ish segment of the community are people here unlawfully, that can have a really big impact on how well the police can do their jobs. It can make a community markedly less safe both for those here unlawfully and those who are not.
Conservatives lament the fact that many (most) folks here illegally have formed far-reaching and lasting ties in their communities - they are husbands and wives, mothers and fathers, friends and neighbors, employees and colleagues. It might not be fair that people who are able to evade enforcement for a decade or two have established connections that make it really damaging to start trying to find and remove them. But that's what's happened, so there can be some very negative effects that local governments have to deal with if their police are actively involved in helping the federal government out.
