1 minute Introduction

● Intro music (5 s)
○ “SKA style intro”?
● This is [title] and I’m your host, Fleur Uittenbogaard.
● Clip from This American Life (25 s)
○ “All I know-- to be frank, what I know about United States, I know
a country that can protect your human rights. That's one best thing
that I know about-- that I knew before coming, that it's a country
that protects human rights. It was a county that I believed will
protect me. I was taking the option because all I need was just
protection. All I need was just protection” (Calhoun).
● That was Jonathan, a political refugee from Cameroon, explaining why he
sought asylum in the United States. He was featured on Act 3 of a recent
episode of This American Life, called “Squeaker”. Today, we’ll be talking
about the history of immigration, ICE, and sanctuary cities, with a focus
on Washington state. (30 s).

45 s Background
● Transition music (3 s)
○ “Lofi and Chill”
● So back in 2019, WA State Senate Bill 5497, otherwise known as the Keep
Washington Working Act was passed, officially declaring Washington
state as a sanctuary state, essentially a state-wide version of previously
existing sanctuary legislation on the city level. The bill was first
introduced by Sen. Lisa Wellman of Mercer Island on January 23, 2019,
amended on April 12, and passed by the house also on April 12, 2019. The
bill was then received and passed by the senate on April 24 and signed
into law about a month later, by Gov. Jay Inslee on May 21, 2019 (“2019
Senate Bill 5497: Establishing a Statewide Policy Supporting Washington
State's Economy and Immigrants' Role in the Workplace”). (30 s)
● But, what does it actually mean to be a sanctuary state? What sort of
protections do these places offer? And why and how did we even get here?
(7 s)
● Let’s first take a look at the entangled history of immigration and
incarceration in the United States. (5 s)

2 min The History of Immigration and Incarceration

● Transition music (3 s)
○ “Lofi and Chill”
● The United States has a long history of restricting and criminalizing
immigration. A notable early example you may have heard of is the 1882
Chinese Exclusion Act, which created a 10-year moratorium on Chinese
labor immigration (“An act to execute certain treaty stipulations relating
 to the Chinese, May 6, 1882”). But this was just the beginning. In the
words of Kelly Hernandez, “ By 1917, Congress had banned all Asian
immigration to the United States and also categorically prohibited all
prostitutes, convicts, anarchists, epileptics, “lunatics,” “idiots,” contract
laborers, and those “liable to become public charges” from entering the
United States” (Hernandez). And later, in 1924, the National Origins Act
passed, which further ratified the restriction of immigation to the United
States (Hernandez). (40 s)
● Then in 1929, it became a crime to “unlawfully enter” the United States
(Hernandez). This of course created a legal justification to detain what are
now considered “unlawful immigrants,” which is where our story begins.
(12 s)
● Fast forward to 2003, and something called the Bureau of Immigration
and Customs Enforcement, now known as just U.S. Immigration and
Customs Enforcement or ICE, was established under the newly formed
Department of Homeland Security and tasked with border and
immigration control (“History of ICE”). (15 s)
● Fast forward again to 2018, and ICE now has over 20,ooo employees, a
budget of $7.5 billion, and 40, 520 detention beds spread across 1, 478
adult detention facilities in every state (Cerza). (15 s)
● This brings us back to this idea of sanctuary cities and their role within
immigration enforcement. The basic concept of a sanctuary city is that
police departments will not cooperate with ICE. That is, they will not
detain undocumented or so-called “illlegal” immigrants longer than they
normally would, like the duration of their sentence, or after a holding
period expires, in order to turn them over to ICE officials (America’s
Voice). (25 s)
● Sanctuary cities have recently come into national spotlight as a response
to the current administration’s “tough on immigration” stance. Let’s take a
closer look at sanctuary cities in this new modern context. (10 s)

3 min Sanctuary Cities in the Modern Context

● Transition music (3 s)
○ “Lofi and Chill”
● So, in order to understand the need for sanctuary cities, it’s important to
consider the social and political contexts of our current environment. (5 s)
● And of course, it’s hard to talk about ICE today without discussing the
thousands of children being separated from their parents and held in
cages, even as the pandemic continues to rage. (9 s)
○ Audio clip from #NoKidsinCages (0:57 - 1:08) (11 s)
○ Over 3000 children have been separated from their parents since
Trump took office in 2016 (“Help Stop Family Separation at the
Border”) (5 s)
● President Trump has long campaigned on an “America First” platform,
 purposefully demonizing and excluding immigrants (whether legal or
illegal) from his vision of a “great” America.
● Before I go into specifics, I think these anti-immigrant sentiments can
best be summed up by the president himself. Listen to what he had to say
in a 2018 meeting with California officials:
○ Audio clip: “You wouldn’t believe how bad these people are. They
are not people, they are animals. . .” (Abramson).
○ Akin to animals… that’s what the president of the United States of
America thinks of undocumented immigrants. (20 s)
● Moreover, While his border wall never truly came to fruition, during his
time in office he’s introduced many anti-immigrant policies, such as
executive order “Protecting the Nation from Foreign Terrorist Entry into
the United States,” better known as the Muslim Travel Ban, executive
orders, “Border Security and Immigration Enforcement Improvements,”
and “Enhancing Public Safety in the Interior of the United States,” which
again were both created with the purpose of criminalizing refugees and
immigrants, and finally, the intended cessation of DACA, an Obama-era
program that granted temporary legal status and ended the threat of
deportation to some 800,000 young immigrants. (Sassen). (1 min)
● Looking more in depth at one of these executive orders: “Enhancing
Public Safety in the Interior of the United States”. The more specific goal
of this order was to argue that illegal immigrants posed a “significant
threat to national security and public safety,” and that therefore all
jurisdictions across America must comply with federal immigration laws
or risk a cessation of federal funding, a move that essentially tried to force
sanctuary cities to comply with ICE officials (Roy). This was one of the
Trump administrations’ many attempts to punish sanctuary cities. (35 s)
● An important note: while sanctuary cities may violate this executive order
by failing to cooperate with ICE officials, their true legality is more
complicated, and the constitution actually leans in their favor- according
to the Immigrant Legal Resource Center, “ICE detainers are not warrants
and do not meet basic Fourth Amendment requirements,” meaning that
sanctuary cities are actually in better alignment with the fourth
amendment than cities who comply with ICE detainer orders (Roy). (25 s)
● More recently, under the guise of protecting American jobs, Trump has
halted the issuing of new green cards in an effort to curb legal
immigration during the pandemic (Shear). (7 s)
● IF TIME: localism

3 min Washington State and the Keep Washington Working Act

● Transition music (3 s)
○ “Lofi and Chill”
● With all that in mind, let’s focus back in on Washington state. Like
mentioned earlier, Senate Bill 5497, or the Keep Washington Working Act
 was passed in May of 2019. There are ten main provisions, but here’s the
gist of the bill:
○ It “[prohibits] local law enforcement from questioning about
immigration status, notifying ICE that a noncitizen is in custody,
and detaining someone for civil immigration enforcement”
(Alfaro) (22 s)
○ One notable exception though, is the Department of Corrections,
who can still actively turn people over to ICE (“The System
Explained”) (5 s)
● What’s interesting is the framing of the bill. While it effectively protects
immigrants, especially undocumented immigrants, and as the ACLU of
Washington puts it, “enhances public safety and promotes fairness to
immigrants and protects the privacy and civil rights of all Washington
residents,” the way the bill is worded focuses mainly on the economic
benefits (“Victory for Immigrant Rights: Keep Washington Working Act to
Be Signed into Law”). Listen to this excerpt, directly from the bill (25 s):
○ “Immigrants make a significant contribution to the economic
vitality of this state, and it is essential that the state have policies
that recognize their importance to Washington's economy. (3) In
recognition of this significant contribution to the overall prosperity
and strength of Washington state, the legislature, therefore, has a
substantial and compelling interest in ensuring the state of
Washington remains a place where the rights and dignity of all
residents are maintained and protected in order to keep
Washington working” (Washington State, Legislator) (50 30 s)
○ Whether the bill should be taken at face value, or if it was framed
in this manner simply to appeal to senate republicans remains
unclear. (7 s)
● Of course, the bill also did not come without controversy. In fact, a
handful of Washington sheriffs have refused to comply with the bill
altogether. Here’s the sheriff of Spokane in a Fox News interview shortly
after the bill was signed into law:
○ Audio clip from Fox News (1:50 - 2:05) (Creitz)
○ To clarify, Sheriff Knezovich of Spokane aimed his statements at
Governor Inslee and Speaker of the House, Nancy Peolsi, for
failing to enforce that jurisdictions comply with ICE.
○ Other areas whose sheriffs have pledged to ignore the bill and
continue to cooperate with ICE include Grant County, Marysville,
and notably, the town of Republic, whose sheriff at the time was
Loren Culp, the former Republican challenger for governor
(Fowler). (55 s)
● The main legal argument against sanctuary cities, including the Keep
Washington Working Act, is that “while there are many areas over which
the states and the federal government share responsibility, immigration is
 not one of them,” meaning that states and cities should therefore comply
with federal regulation (Spakovsky). While this is true, it is an
oversimplification and also doesn't consider the constitutional legality of
local law enforcement complying with ICE agents in the first place, as
mentioned earlier in the context of the fourth amendment. (25 s)
● That being said, the Keep Washington Working Act has been endorsed by
the ACLU, the Northwest Immigrants Rights Project, and [La
Resistencia??], among others. (7 s)

1 min 15 40 s Beyond Sanctuary Cities

● Transition music (3 s)
○ “Lofi and Chill”
● However, sanctuary cities and states, including Washington, are not
perfect. While sanctuary cities do stop people from being incarcerated,
they don’t do much else to support immigrants. Additionally, while they
do make a step towards abolition, they alone do not go far enough. Let’s
take a look at a couple “next steps,” so to speak, to improve them beyond
just noncompliance with ICE. (10 s)
● One of the two examples we’ll be looking at today is the idea of inclusive
health policies. At the national level, undocumented immigrants are less
likely to have a primary care physician, less likely to visit the emergency
room, and less likely to to have health insurance than citizens. The push
for inclusive health policies essentially argues that along with schools and
law enforcement, health care workers should not have to comply with ICE
officials. The idea is that if undocumented people are not putting
themselves at risk for detainment or even deportation by seeking
helathcare, it will aid in lowering the barriers they already face as well as
increase their health outcomes (Aboii). (30 s)
● The second example has to do with the National Crime Information
Center database, or the NCIC. In 2002, the NCIC began to document civil
immigration violations in addition to criminal records, allowing any law
enforcement officer access to someone’s immigration status even if it is in
no way relevant to their case. Thus, the NCIC undermines the efforts
made by sanctuary cities to reduce cooperation with ICE. In order to
combat this, sanctuary cities and states should ensure that there is specific
legislation or provisions within current legislation that clearly outlines
when and how law enforcement officers are allowed to access and use the
NCIC, especially when seeking information regarding immigration status
(Sullivan). (40 s)
● These two reforms are also examples of what’s called a non-reformist
reform, which essentially means that they work outside of the existing
system, and ask “why prison?”. They take power away from what’s called
the prison industrial complex, which is sort of like a fancy name for the
system of prisons, the profitization of prisons, and the relationship
 between them. Both inclusive health policies and NCIC regulation, and
even sanctuary legislation, seek to reduce the amount of people in prison,
and ultimately, imagine a society without the need for a carceral system.
Continuing to push for these sorts of reforms over ones that will funnel
money and power back into prisons is where abolitionists are focusing
their energy.

50 s Conclusion
● Transition music (3 s)
○ “Lofi and Chill”
● So, where does this leave us? On the one hand, Biden’s election may signal
the end to an intensely anti-immigrant administration. But on the other,
anti-immigrant sentiments have a long and pervasive history within
American society. Though As we look towards the future, there is some
hope of abolition. (15 s)
● Groups like Mijente, La Resistencia, United We Dream, Campaign
#Not1More, among many others work towards a common goal of
abolition in many contexts, including ICE. It takes the form of petitions,
demonstrations, phone banking, and an overall effort to reach as many
people as possible. (17 s)
● Going back all the way to the beginning of this podcast, if you remember
Jonathan, if you’re wondering what happened to him, unfortunately his
story doesn’t seem like it will have a happy ending: after getting his
request for an application for political asylum denied, he was scheduled
for a flight back to Cameroon, where there’s a warrant for his arrest
(Calhoun). (20 s)

15 s Outro
● I’d like to leave you with one final thought: if you’d like to help people like
Jonathan, consider supporting one of the abolition groups I mentioned
earlier- whether that’s signing petitions, calling your state representatives,
or actually attending protests is up to you. (13 s)
● Transition music (3 s)
○ “Lofi and Chill”
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