SAN ANTONIO (CN) — Texas cities went to battle Monday against the state in Federal Court over the constitutionality of Senate Bill 4, which prohibits sanctuary cities and punishes local officials with jail time for refusing to cooperate with federal immigration officers.
Hundreds of opponents to Texas’ new immigration law rallied outside the courthouse and marched through the Alamo City’s Hemisfair Park and River Walk, as U.S. District Judge Orlando Garcia heard hours of arguments from attorneys seeking a preliminary injunction to stop the law from taking effect in September.
The bill, signed into law by Gov. Greg Abbott in May, would punish local officials who refuse to comply with detainer requests from immigration officers, and allow local law enforcement to question the immigration status of any “lawfully detained” person, including people stopped for minor offenses such as jaywalking or running a stop sign.
Under SB 4, state and local government officials, including college campus police, who refuse to comply with detainer requests would be subject to Class A misdemeanor charges, punishable by up to a year in jail and fines of up to $25,000 a day.
Abbott, who championed the bill as one of his “emergency items” during the recent legislative session, said the intent of SB 4 is to make communities safer by keeping criminal immigrants off the streets.
But throughout the 140-day legislative session, which ended in May, opponents, including several police chiefs and sheriffs, told lawmakers that SB 4 would make communities less safe by making immigrants distrustful of police and reluctant to report crimes.
Opponents vowed to fight SB 4 in a “summer of resistance.” In the 40 days since the bill was signed into law, major cities, including San Antonio, Dallas, Houston and Austin, joined the lawsuit against the state, filed by the small border town of El Cenizo, pop. 3,300, and Maverick County.
Several counties, local officials and social justice groups have also joined the lawsuit.
“A historic number of cities have responded to the people’s call, and said, ‘We hear you, we support you, and we are here in this fight today,’” Austin City Councilman Gregorio Casar told protesters outside the courthouse Monday. “The message we are sending Trump and Abbott and their cronies today is clear: Your hatred is no longer welcome in Texas.”
Casar, who was arrested in May with nearly two dozen others after a sit-in at Abbott’s office, said the case will determine whether the Constitution’s declaration of “We the People” applied to all who call America their home or only to those who wield power in society.
“This is an important moment for ‘we the people,” Casar said. “Brave women and men have protested and marched, fought and died to expand the definition of ‘we the people’, to expand the promise of ‘we the people’ … [that is] what the fight in today’s court hearing is all about.