A federal judge has dismissed the Trump administration’s lawsuit against Los Angeles over its “sanctuary city” policy, the latest in a series of federal court rulings that have blocked the administration’s legal efforts to force Democratic-led cities to cooperate with immigration enforcement.
Judge Fernando Olguin of the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California on Saturday rejected the administration’s argument that the city’s ordinance — which bars the use of city resources to aid federal immigration enforcement — was an unconstitutional attempt to regulate the federal government. Olguin found instead that the ordinance “controls the actions of the city’s own agents and agencies,” according to the ruling.
The judge gave the administration permission to file an amended complaint. The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the decision Monday, The Guardian reported.
Los Angeles City Attorney Hydee Feldstein Soto said in a statement Monday that the ruling was a legal victory for the city, which saw a surge in immigration raids by ICE and Border Patrol agents last summer.
“This order reinforces the well-established principle that local governments have the authority to decide how to use their personnel and resources,” Feldstein Soto said. “The goal of this ordinance, and of LAPD’s immigration-related policies — which date back to special order 40 in the 1970s — is to encourage victims of and witnesses to crime to feel safe coming forward to seek help from LAPD regardless of their immigration status. It does not obstruct or impede lawful federal immigration enforcement operations.”
The administration’s lawsuit, filed last June, alleged that Los Angeles violated federal law by enacting policies barring city resources from being used to aid immigration enforcement operations or collect information about individuals’ citizenship status. The lawsuit came weeks after Trump deployed troops to quell protests in Los Angeles against deportation operations.
The Trump administration has filed several lawsuits challenging similar policies adopted in jurisdictions run by Democrats. Federal judges have dismissed administration lawsuits brought against the cities of Boston and Chicago. As MSI previously reported, a federal judge in April threw out a Justice Department bid against Colorado and Denver over similar immigration limits.