Statements this week by Mayor Ed Gainey and his Democratic primary challenger, Allegheny County Controller Corey O’Connor, have raised the question of the City of Pittsburgh’s cooperation with deportation actions by the federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency, or ICE. Both men, in different ways, indicated that Pittsburgh’s public safety personnel would not contribute to ICE operations within the city.
“I am not going to be working with ICE. My administration will not work with ICE,” said Mr. Gainey at the Pennsylvania Press Club in Harrisburg on Monday. The next day, Mr. O’Connor released a statement that read, in part: “The role of the Department of Public Safety is to serve everyone in need, not to do the job of ICE.” Both remarks were greeted with apoplexy by supporters of President Donald Trump’s aggressive deportation policy, with some suggesting the city should be investigated for refusing to comply with the illegal immigration crackdown.
These criticisms, however, are based on a misunderstanding of local government’s negligible role in federal immigration enforcement. The City of Pittsburgh, after all, doesn’t have enough police officers to enforce state and local laws, let alone get into the immigration business. The truth is that it’s important — for the sake of human dignity and public safety — that undocumented people in Pittsburgh, along with their family and friends and neighbors, know that they can call upon local emergency and law enforcement agencies without fear of getting turned over to ICE.
Two agencies, two jobs
There’s almost no scenario in which Pittsburgh public safety personnel would be asked to “work with ICE,” and so statements promising not to do so should not be considered radical policy declarations. Rather, they are descriptions of the status quo, and restatements of “unbiased policing” policies that have been in place for over a decade.
Further, Pittsburgh has never declared itself a “sanctuary city,” which is itself a political term that lacks any legal or official definition. Nothing Mr. Gainey or Mr. O’Connor has said would change that.
In practice, ICE pursues its targets independently, and neither notifies nor requires the cooperation of local law enforcement when its agents attempt to detain a suspected undocumented immigrant. The agency operates independently as a federal law enforcement agency whose remit is completely distinct from that of municipal (or county) agencies. This means that a pledge to “not work with ICE” has no consequences for ICE operations in Pittsburgh or its suburbs.
Those who expect local police to be involved with immigration actions misunderstand the nature of the agencies in question. More than that, in the case of Pittsburgh, they’re asking for something counterproductive: With fewer than 700 officers available for duty — and declining, despite Mr. Gainey’s claims to the contrary — the bureau of police simply doesn’t have the manpower to divert its attention from the everyday business of enforcing city and state law.
Following the law
In fact, the level of local government ICE is most likely to interact with isn’t the City of Pittsburgh: It’s Allegheny County. That’s because one of ICE’s favorite places to pick up undocumented immigrants is local jails.
For over a decade, the Allegheny County Jail has acted in accordance with a 2014 decision by the Third Circuit Court of Appeals, which covers Delaware, New Jersey and Pennsylvania. In that case, Galarza v. Szalczyk, et al., judges ruled that ICE requests for local jails to hold detainees beyond the normal time period are administrative requests, not charges. (Illegal immigration is a civil offense, not a criminal offense, under federal law.) That means that if the local jail complies, but it turns out the ICE request was illegal, the jail could be legally liable.
Therefore, ACJ follows the law by declining to prolong detainees’ stays so ICE can pick them up. This is not, as some would have it, an attempt by the county to thumb its nose at federal law enforcement or the Trump administration, but rather an attempt to follow the law as it is interpreted in Pennsylvania by the Third Circuit. To the extent this hamstrings ICE, it is because the law binds everyone alike, including local jails and federal agencies.
And, like Pittsburgh, Allegheny County has never declared itself a “sanctuary.”
Humanity intact
One way local law enforcement could collaborate with ICE is to ascertain the immigration status of people who come into contact with them, and then report that information to the federal agency. But there are good public safety reasons not to do so.
It is important that every member of the community feel safe reporting a crime or other emergency to their local first responders. Imagine, for instance, an undocumented immigrant who is a victim of domestic violence. It is essential that she, for her own safety and for the safety of the wider community, is able to call 911 without fear that a police officer will ask for documentation, and report her to ICE.
The same goes from everything from car accidents to house fires: Pittsburgh public safety personnel can only serve the entire community well if they can be trusted to maintain their focus on their own jurisdiction, and not that of federal immigration enforcement agencies. The desire to enforce immigration law must be held in balance with the demands of human dignity, and the broader obligations to community health and safety held by local police.
Illegal immigration is a civil legal offense. But the proper punishment is not, and cannot become, complete vulnerability to violence and danger due to an inability to rely on local public safety agencies. Crossing a border, even illegally, does not void a person’s humanity.
Therefore, both Mr. Gainey and Mr. O’Connor are correct: There is no need for Pittsburgh police to work with ICE. Everyone is safer when the two agencies pursue their own paths.
First Published: January 30, 2025, 10:30 a.m.