Protect Local Police From Federal Immigration Mandates

The administration is threatening to cut federal funding to sanctuary cities and their states unless local police do ICE work.

A letter to your members of Congress. Facts checked September 23, 2026.

The explainer behind this letter Sanctuary Cities and States What sanctuary policies do, the federal list, and the funding fight

The Letter

Subject Do not punish cities for local policing choices

Our local police should be solving local crime, not doing the federal government's immigration work. That is a choice cities and counties get to make for themselves. The Supreme Court said so in 1997 in Printz v. United States. Washington cannot force state or local officers to enforce federal law.

The administration has tried to cut federal funding to so-called sanctuary cities, and in 2026 to their entire states, unless they hand their police over to ICE. Federal judges keep blocking it. Courts stopped the cuts to cities in 2025, and in March 2026 a judge kept more than $600 million in public health grants flowing to four states.

This is about who controls your hometown police, not about whether immigration law exists. Federal agents already operate everywhere, including in sanctuary cities. The only thing these policies change is whether a local jail holds someone for ICE without a judge's warrant, which can get a county sued for violating the Fourth Amendment.

There is a real public-safety cost to forcing the issue. When people fear that calling the police means deportation, they stop reporting crimes and stop coming forward as witnesses. A Stanford study found no rise in crime after counties adopted sanctuary policies, and a study of nearly 2,500 counties found crime was lower in sanctuary counties.

Please oppose any bill or budget rider that conditions general federal funding for states and cities on local immigration cooperation, and protect the community-trust policing that keeps neighborhoods safe.

Send Your Letter

Resistbot

Copy the letter above and fax, email, or mail it to your state or federal representatives.

Text RESIST to 50409 to get started

Send via Resistbot

Democracy.io

Copy the letter above and email it to your House and Senate members.

Free tool from the Electronic Frontier Foundation. Federal officials only.

Send via Democracy.io

Call Your Representative

U.S. Capitol switchboard: (202) 224-3121

I'm calling to ask the representative to oppose federal funding threats against states and cities over their immigration policies.
The Supreme Court ruled in 1997 that Washington cannot force local police to enforce federal law. Cutting funding to coerce them does the same thing through the back door.
Courts keep blocking these cuts. Judges stopped them for cities in 2025 and for four states' public health grants in March 2026.
I want local police focused on local crime. When people fear deportation, they stop reporting crimes. Please protect community-trust policing.

Calls get logged by topic. Volume drives the briefing.

The Facts Behind the Ask

1997 Printz v. United States held the federal government cannot force local police to enforce federal law (source)
33 places on the Justice Department sanctuary list as revised October 31, 2025 (source)
Blocked courts repeatedly stopped the administration from cutting funding over sanctuary status (source)
No rise in crime after counties adopted sanctuary policies, in a 2020 Stanford study published in PNAS (source)

See every letter you can send