It has been five years since Washington’s signature “sanctuary” law went into effect, prohibiting most local officials from cooperating with immigration enforcement. Since then, Washington jail and law enforcement agencies have committed hundreds of alleged violations, according to a report published Thursday by the University of Washington’s Center for Human Rights.
That may not surprise some familiar with a 2021 report by the UW center, documenting early flouting of the Keep Washington Working Act, or those who pointed out that the law has no built-in enforcement mechanisms.
What’s new, according to this report: Most — though possibly not all — agencies have changed course, often after being contacted by immigrant advocates or state Attorney General Bob Ferguson’s office.
“We see that a lot of jurisdictions have made great strides in coming into compliance with the law,” said Angelina Snodgrass Godoy, the UW center’s director. “But there are still some outliers.”
Despite the mostly positive outlook, the report drew sharp criticism from at least one county official.
“Regarding the parts of this report I am familiar with, the report is misleading, inaccurate and inflammatory,” said Grant County Prosecuting Attorney Kevin McCrae in an email.
The report cites a February 2023 letter from state Assistant Attorney General Emily Nelson to Grant County, which chastised the prosecutor’s office for contacting immigration officials more than 400 times to share information about people at the county jail. The information included dates of birth, FBI numbers, home addresses, driver’s license numbers and anticipated jail release dates, according to Nelson’s letter.
Such information sharing constitutes some of the most common alleged violations discussed in the UW center’s report, which draws upon Attorney General Office records obtained by public records requests and information from immigrant advocacy groups.
McCrae said only names and dates of birth were routinely shared — and that practice was stopped before he was contacted by the Attorney General’s office. County officials provided more detailed information about less than a dozen people, he said.
The report comes amid shifting political winds around immigration. A record number of migrants recently crossing the southern border legally and illegally, some of whom have made their way to the Seattle area, has made immigration enforcement a top concern among many conservative voters and sparked a bipartisan drive to strengthen border security.
Former President Donald Trump promises mass roundups and deportations of undocumented immigrants if he is elected back into office in November. Meanwhile, presumptive Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris, who as vice president was charged with tackling the migration influx, is portraying herself as a tough former prosecutor who knows better than Trump how to stop criminals from crossing the border.
In Washington, state GOP Chair Jim Walsh earlier this year proposed an initiative to compel local law enforcement to cooperate with federal immigration officials, which would nullify Keep Washington Working. Walsh, also a state representative from Aberdeen, said he put signature gathering on hold to concentrate on another initiative but plans to refile another year.
And Republican gubernatorial candidate Dave Reichert, when asked for his views on Keep Washington Working, said through a spokesperson he favors changing the law to allow cooperation with federal authorities. To explain why, he referred to cartels bringing fentanyl into the U.S.
Godoy and Phil Neff, a research coordinator at the UW center, said they worry the changing political climate might prompt local agencies to skirt the law again, or at least to push into its gray areas.
A possible ramping up of immigration enforcement could put Washington’s sanctuary law to the test, Neff said.
Lawmakers passed Keep Washington Working when then-President Trump was backtracking on late-term policies of predecessor Barack Obama that limited ICE’s operations. Instead of telling ICE to mainly target people who committed crimes, Trump tasked immigration agents with going after anyone who was undocumented.
Washington’s Department of Licensing was at the same time routinely sharing information and photos from driver’s license applications with ICE, Seattle Times reporting revealed.
The subsequently passed law forbids most local officials from sharing private, personal information with immigration authorities in a noncriminal matter.
It also prohibits the once common practice of honoring ICE requests to hold people in jail until agents can pick them up and take them into federal detention. That practice seems to have largely stopped, according to the UW report.
Also apparently ended or significantly diminished: allowing ICE agents into jails to question people, and contracts to use jails as immigrant detention facilities. Keep Washington Working bars both practices.
Regarding information sharing, the picture is somewhat murkier. Some of the counties named in the report argue the actions cited may not constitute violations. McCrae of Grant County, for instance, said he did not know whether the detailed information shared with immigration authorities concerned a criminal matter, which would be allowed under the law.
Kent City Attorney Tammy White made a similar point when defending her agency.
The UW report said a Kent police sergeant shared names, addresses and photos of individuals with immigration officials, sometimes on his own initiative. In one case, for instance, the sergeant emailed ICE agents to discuss a man wanted on a DUI warrant who eluded police officers while driving 80 miles per hour with a 6-month-old in the car.
White, in communication with the Attorney General’s office, said that constituted a criminal matter that made the exchange with ICE permissible.
Neff, of the UW center, was dubious. “My question would be: Is this a criminal matter that justifies sending some information to an ICE deportation officer?” he said. He acknowledged the law is vague on this question.
Godoy, the center’s director, added that Keep Washington Working was specifically written to prevent law enforcement officers from communicating with ICE about suspects encountered on a day-to-day basis. She said the law’s exemption for criminal matters was likely intended for investigations by a branch of ICE dealing with international crime like human trafficking and drug smuggling.
Still, the haziness of the law leaves open the likelihood that some information sharing will continue.
Another case in point is Adams County. Nelson of the Attorney General’s office contacted the county in late 2022 to say it was violating Keep Washington Working in reaching out to immigration officials more than 200 times since the law went into effect to provide private information about people in its jails, according to the report.
County Prosecuting Attorney Randy Flyckt, writing back, offered to meet with Nelson and her team. But the report’s authors found no indication of such a meeting, suggesting the practices may be ongoing.
The report also said an Adams County sheriff’s sergeant agreed on one occasion to let ICE agents accompany local officers in verifying the address of a registered sex offender.
County officials did not respond to a request for comment.
Even with local officials fully complying with Keep Washington Working, the report notes, immigration officials have access to some Washington law enforcement information through local and federal databases that automatically interact with each other. ICE, for instance, will be notified when fingerprints of someone booked into a jail match those of someone federal agents have encountered before.
And Keep Washington Working exempts the Department of Corrections from its ban on sharing information. Supporters of the exemption reason that people in prison have committed crimes that may warrant their deportation, while opponents say it amounts to double jeopardy.
A DOC official said the department last year provided immigration authorities with information about 91 people.
