Connecticut Sues Trump Administration over Tying Grant Money to Immigration RulesTop Stories

July 19, 2018 06:47
Connecticut Sues Trump Administration over Tying Grant Money to Immigration Rules

(Image source from: Hartford Courant)

Connecticut on Wednesday filed a lawsuit against the United States President Donald Trump's administration over new regulations that force states to abide by with "zero tolerance" immigration policies to receive routine law enforcement grants.

The legal action joins Massachusetts, New Jersey, Virginia and Washington, D.C., in asking a U.S. District Court to block the Trump administration from withholding the money.

For Connecticut, over $1.7 million allocated to state and local police is at peril this year.

"President Trump and Attorney General Sessions are assuming power they don't have and literally putting lives at risk," Governor Dannel P. Malloy said.

"Connecticut has taken a leadership role in standing up to this president’s repugnant immigration policies, including the cruel and heartless 'zero-tolerance' family separation order," Malloy said.

The conditions imposed by the U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions necessitate that states provide federal immigration officials with beforehand notice of an immigrant's scheduled release from a correctional facility, let agents access to prisons to question immigrants and forces states to certify compliance with the federal information-sharing law.

If any of those conditions are not met, the Justice Department is withholding grant money routinely distributed by past administrations.

The legal action follows a Bridgeport federal judge's recent regnant that the separation of two children now being detained in Connecticut was unconstitutional and order that those children be reunited with the parents. The children were taken from their parents after the family illegally crossed the U.S. and Mexican border as part of Trump's "zero tolerance" policy.

The lawsuit filed in U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York argues that the administration demands interfere with the rights of states and localities to set their own law enforcement policies and that the Justice Department lacks authority to impose conditions on states.

"These grants support vital local law enforcement initiatives and were designed to give states access to funds to support a broad variety of public safety needs," Attorney General Jepsen said.

"The Department of Justice has no authority to impose conditions, and no basis on which to use these grants to impose its will on state and municipal law enforcement when it comes to the Trump Administration's distasteful and damaging immigration policies," Jepsen said.

Malloy said the lawsuit marks another conflict against Trump's "unlawful" immigration policies.

"Our state is once again at the forefront in fighting back against yet another unlawful, unconstitutional and unintelligible Trump administration directive," Malloy said. "President Trump and Attorney General Sessions are assuming power they don’t have and literally putting lives at risk."

The lawsuit notes that the Byrne JAG program render grants to states and localities according to a mandatory statutory formula.

"Congress designed Byrne JAG to give states and localities a reliable source of law enforcement funding, while also giving them maximum flexibility to decide how to use the funds in accordance with state and local law-enforcement policy," the suit contends.

In past years, the state passed much of the grant funding to state agencies and local jurisdictions to assist law enforcement and criminal justice programs, including the Statewide Narcotic Task Force and Connecticut's opioid intervention project for local police departments.

By Sowmya Sangam

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