Republican lawmakers seek to strip District of Columbia of its sanctuary city policies

FIRST ON FOX: Republican lawmakers are launching an effort that would require the nation’s capital to abandon its sanctuary city policies. 

Sanctuary cities are local jurisdictions that restrict cooperation with federal immigration authorities, including refusing to comply with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) detainer requests. 

As a result, the District of Columbia Federal Immigration Compliance Act would eliminate sanctuary city laws in the District of Columbia and bar Washington, D.C., from implementing any policy that allows it to circumvent complying with Homeland Security and ICE on detainer requests for illegal immigrants. 

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Sen. Bill Hagerty introduced the measure in the Senate on April 30, 2025. (Al Drago/Bloomberg via Getty Images)

“Unconscionable that our nation’s capital would facilitate illegality and thwart federal law enforcement efforts,” Sen. Bill Hagerty, R-Tenn., who introduced the measure in the Senate Wednesday, said in a statement to Fox News Digital. “President Trump’s efforts to enforce immigration laws should not be undermined by local leadership anywhere in the United States, let alone Washington, D.C.”  

Washington has a series of sanctuary city policies. For example, the D.C. City Council adopted a measure in 2020 that restricts D.C. officials from learning the immigration status of individuals in custody, and bars the jurisdiction from transferring individuals to federal immigration agencies. 

Other jurisdictions with sanctuary city policies include Chicago, New York City, Boston and Los Angeles, according to the Center for Immigration Studies.

Meanwhile, a federal judge blocked the Trump administration in April from restricting federal funds for sanctuary cities, claiming it violates the Constitution’s separation of powers principles and the spending clause, in addition to the Fifth and 10th Amendments.

Rep. Clay Higgins, R-La., introduced the legislation in the House in March. 

“Sanctuary policies have devastating real-life consequences,” Higgins said in a Wednesday statement. “As our nation’s capital, Washington, D.C., should be the safest, most ‘America First’ city in the United States, and Congress has the constitutional authority to end the city’s sanctuary status.”

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Rep. Clay Higgins introduced the legislation in the House in March. (Tom Williams/CQ-Roll Call, Inc via Getty Images)

The legislation aligns with initiatives from the White House to crack down on sanctuary cities. 

On Monday, President Donald Trump signed an executive order demanding the Justice Department and Homeland Security establish a list of all sanctuary cities failing to follow federal immigration laws.

Per the executive order, cities will receive notification and have the opportunity to drop the sanctuary status. Failure to do so could cause them to risk losing federal funding, according to the executive order. 

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The order also instructs Attorney General Pam Bondi and Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem to “pursue all legal remedies” to encourage sanctuary cities into compliance with federal law, according to a Monday White House fact sheet shared with Fox News Digital.

“It’s quite simple: obey the law, respect the law, and don’t obstruct federal immigration officials and law enforcement officials when they are simply trying to remove public safety threats from our nation’s communities,” White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt told reporters Monday. “The American public don’t want illegal alien criminals in their communities. They made that quite clear on Nov. 5, and this administration is determined to enforce our nation’s immigration laws.”