As federal immigration authorities began appearing in courthouses to execute arrests of suspected undocumented residents, the 17 judges on the Franklin County Court of Common Pleas unanimously voted to prohibit immigration-related arrests on the courthouse grounds.
They said doing so would promote safe and secure access to justice for all witnesses, victims, and defendants, whatever their immigration status.
On Wednesday, GOP state Sen. Kristina Roegner, of Hudson, began the political process of changing state law to force the Franklin County judges and all other public offices to allow such arrests. This would apply even without a signed judicial warrant or when a person is only suspected of being “unlawfully present” in the country. The policy would amount to state assistance in immigration enforcement, which has traditionally been handled by the federal government.
The proposal, introduced as Senate Bill 172, marks the latest instance of state lawmakers following President Donald Trump’s lead in an aggressive deportation as part of his “America first” agenda. It also follows a longer-standing pattern of conservative state lawmakers regularly passing laws that usurp policies enacted by Ohio’s generally liberal big cities.
Franklin County judges won’t allow ICE arrests on site
The judges adopted two new emergency rules in February. They say that no one is subject to a civil arrest (the deportation process is controlled by civil, not criminal laws) on courthouse property, unless the arresting authority has a warrant signed by a judge.
Additionally, unless it’s necessary to perform any judicial duty, the new rules prohibit court personnel from asking about people’s immigration status, providing immigration officers with non-public information about a person’s release date, or assisting in immigration enforcement actions.
The judges said they worry that arrests on court grounds could scare away witnesses, victims and others who are present everyday and are critical to a justice system where all defendants in criminal court are legally presumed innocent until proven guilty. The judges said that if people stayed away it could impair their ability to consider cases justly.
“To that end, the following rules are designed to promote the safe and secure access to court facilities for all residents having business with the Court, including victims, witnesses, and defendants, regardless of immigration status and to reduce disruptions to the disposition of both criminal and civil cases in this Court, while at the same time safeguarding the rights of litigants to the just processing of their cases,” the judges wrote in a rationale with the new rules.
Judge Carl Aveni, chairman of the county’s rules committee, didn’t respond to an email about Roegner’s bill.
Lawmaker says judges must allow civil arrests on site
The bill, generally speaking, demands the opposite of the judges’ new policy. However, it’s broader than just judges, stretching into almost all public offices and officials.
It says that no person suspected of being unlawfully present is privileged from arrest, regardless of any warrant. Public officials under the bill also can’t “obstruct or otherwise interfere, directly or indirectly, with a federal, state, or local law enforcement agency or officer” attempting an arrest.
The bill also says such public officials can’t prohibit anyone from asking about or providing information about a person’s immigration status or release date.
Introducing the bill to a Senate committee on Wednesday, Roegner said evidence of the need for the bill can be found in Boston, where a municipal judge charged a U.S. Immigrations and Customs Enforcement agent with contempt after the agent detained a suspect who was leaving a courthouse. That charge was later dropped by a federal judge.
Sen. Casey Weinstein, a Democrat who’s also from Hudson, asked Roegner in committee about instances of those lawfully present in the U.S. who have faced arrest or even deportation under the current Trump administration.
“If someone is here legally, they would really have nothing to fear,” Roegner said.
The bill adds to a familiar pattern that begins with an Ohio city, under Democratic control, enacting a progressive policy. Then the state legislature, under Republican control, blocks that city’s policy. State lawmakers, for instance, have blocked city’s regulations on guns, tobacco, and the “right” to natural gas and propane access. Even a city’s placement of commercial pet stores have been a subject of such city-versus-state tussles. These have all occurred despite language in the Ohio Constitution granting cities “home rule” or rights of self-governance, specifically including police power.
The legislation is also one of a long-list of policy proposals offered by Republicans to restrict rights of undocumented immigrants or offer state assistance to Trump’s deportation. That includes:
- House Bill 1, which would prevent people from adversarial countries from owning certain property in the state
- House Bill 26, to require law enforcement to assist the enforcement of federal immigration law
- House Bill 42, to require law enforcement, jail authorities, Medicaid, and the Department of Job and Family Services to collect and report citizenship data
- House Bill 281, to require hospitals to allow federal immigration officials to sweep buildings seeking unlawful immigrants
- House Bill 282, to add immigration status as a required factor for both sentencing and setting bail
None of these have yet become law.
Trump ramps up deportations
Around the country, the Trump administration has waged an aggressive mass deportation campaign, which several judges have deemed unlawful. The U.S. Supreme Court has ruled against the administration both in its deportation of a Maryland man to a prison in El Salvador in what federal lawyers called an “administrative error,” and in the administration’s use of the Alien Enemies Act of 1798 as the legal authority to justify deportation of Venezuelans said to be unlawfully present. Other federal judges have ruled against Trump policies of deporting people to South Sudan who aren’t from there, rescinding visas granted to international students, blocking arriving immigrants from entering asylum claims, and others.
Resistance has been met with retribution. In Wisconsin, U.S. District Judge Hannah Duggan was accused by the FBI of obstruction of justice and concealing a person from arrest, after she allegedly allowed him to leave her courtroom amid a domestic abuse allegation through a nonpublic door to evade federal officials seeking his arrest. The Democratic mayor of Newark, New Jersey and Democratic U.S. Rep. LaMonica McIver were both recently arrested after protesting outside a federal immigration detention facility, though charges were dropped against the mayor.
