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The Senate Bill 4 was signed into law by Governor Greg Abbott early September 2018. The bill was a measure to ban the sanctuary cities by punishing jurisdictions that did not fully cooperate with the federal immigration officials with the aim of curbing immigration to Texas (Paxton, 2018). Despite the signing, the bill has been faced by major challenges that include opposition from the immigrants as well as pending cases in courts that awaits to be passed. Many cities that include Austin across the state of Texas has come forward prepared to challenge the bill in court as the law enforcement agencies, local officials as well as the immigration attorneys have been provided with a new task of studying the probable changes that would emerge in the event that the bill is fully passed into law. Therefore, the Senate Bill 4 has been a controversial and to which every side, both the critics and its supporters have no idea of what will follow next as well as what will be the take of the authorities.

According to the Senate Bill 4, a sanctuary city is a city, county or state that has imposed limitations in cooperation with the federal immigration and customs enforcement agents in arresting and detention or the sharing of information that regards immigrants living in the states without the legal requirements (Margulies, 2018). Therefore, this means that the local officials in the sanctuary states choose not to cooperate with the Immigration and Customs Enforcement through sharing information regarding people suspected to have made their way into the states or cities without authorization. Besides, the sanctuary cities may also imply that the local officials may choose not to release some of the unauthorized immigrants in their custody to the federal immigration authorities. Also, the sanctuary cities may be described as cities inhabited by police departments to which have chosen and instructed their officers not to question people about their immigration status.

The Senate bill 4 is aimed at banning such cities to ensure close collaboration between the county jail and the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents. Texas governor signed the bill into law on May 7 during a Facebook live broadcast and to which sparkled various reactions among the residents and officials in Texas. Upon the signing of the bill, two major changes emerged that include; sanctuary counties and other counties in the state of Texas were to comply with the federal immigration agents through providing information regarding the plight of the illegal immigrants in their counties, with no exceptions. The jurisdiction that failed to comply with the bill were eligible to a fine of up to 25,000 dollars a day. The second change is that officers with any law enforcement agency were provided with the rights to question people of their immigration status, a move that had more negatives than benefits to Texans, considering that majority of its residents are immigrants.

Supporters of the Senate Bill 4 claim that the bill would not hurt anyone who is not a criminal. According to Abbott, the bill –SB 4 was targeted to criminals who were in the state illegally and who committed crimes in the state. According to a message sent to the Hispanic community, Governor Abbott appeal to the community is that they do not fall for all of the rumors on broadcast in that if anyone was clean, then they had nothing to fear about. However, the governor added that if anyone was a criminal and have done something wrong, then they had a reason to worry about whether they are in the state legally or illegally.

Apart from the governor’s support to the bill, the Sheriffs of the various countys claimed that the SB 4 would help improve public safety (Villazor & Gulasekaram, 2018). In their expression, the sheriffs claimed that questioning people about their immigration status will help reduce the number of illegal immigrants into the country and through this, the police will be able to monitor the activities of the immigrants. Censorship and collaboration with the ICE would play a great role in countering terrorism in that most of the terrorists are always foreign nationalist who either come to the United States to learn or via the green card while other just cross the borders without being noticed. When a person enters the United States boundaries without being noticed, they might engage in any criminal office as they are not traceable and therefore, the Senate Bill 4 will help in reducing the rate of crimes in the State. Although the bill is aimed at reducing and arresting illegal immigrants, it does not provide a way to bar people from entering the state.

Supporters of the Senate Bill 4 claim that the implementation of the law will encourage self-deportation as those who are living in the US borders illegally will be pressured to leave the state and the country at large in fear of being caught and taken to prison. Through this, the government will be able to reduce the number of immigrants in Texas and the entire country on the basis that illegal immigration will be feared little or no chance for new illegal immigrants.

Despite the governor being in the foreplay in defending the bill, the police departments, which is part of the government, was opposed to the bill. The police departments, with such organizations as the Texas Police Chiefs Association and the Texas Major Cities Chiefs, declared their opposition for the bill. The two organization in an American-Statesman opinion piece dated April 28 said that they were opposed to the Senate Bill 4 as they were of the opinion that the law accelerates the development of a rift between the local police departments and the local immigrant communities and this would lead to a rise in crimes against the immigrants as well as in the broader community (Reed, 2019). The police organizations also claimed that the law would create a class of silent victims and at the same time eliminate the potential for the local community collaboration with the police in solving and as well preventing crimes that related to immigration. To maintain law and order, therefore, the Austin police held a meeting with the Latino and other immigrant communities assuring them that their services and cooperation will remain the same regardless of whether the bill was passed as a law or not, serving the community as they always have without discrimination.

Advocacy groups on the other side claim that questioning people about their migration status will erode the trust of law enforcement considering that every police including the universities and school districts are provided with a mandate to ask people they stop and to whom they suspect of breaking the law regarding immigration. Most of the immigrants into the United States are the people of color, and this translates to the immigrants in Texas. Randomly questioning people of their immigration status does not affect the whites as they are presumed to be legal citizens but affects the people of color that include the black people, Mexicans, and the Latinos. When such happens, these people are confronted based on their skin color and therefore, can be considered as racial profiling. Besides, the advocates claim that the law is against the United States Constitution in that it forces the local government entities to cooperate with the federal immigration enforcement. Therefore, according to advocates, the Senate Bill 4 not only violates the US Constitution by forcing government entities to cooperate but also curtailing the freedom of movement and privacy of the people of color thus promoting racial discrimination.

Sanctuary cities allow for the implementation of more lenient laws to the immigrants, and this implies that fewer immigrants get into the hands of the law enforcement officers, thus being incarcerated for undeserving crimes (O’Connell, 2019). Activists argue that the locking up of immigrants, whether illegal or legal merely because of existing beyond their borders violates the human rights in accordance with the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR). They continue to argue that sanctuary cities provide a potential solution to the overcrowded prisons as most of the imprisoned people are immigrants are arrested merely because they don’t possess the full legal documentation, and thus considered as a threat not only to the state but also to the United States as a whole.

Most of the time, immigration is either caused by drought or war and therefore, most of the immigrants in various nations around the globes are simply in the camps or in the nation because they ran away from their homes in fear of losing their lives. Therefore, not all the immigrants would have preferred to leave their country only to be hunted by the law enforcement of that country as stray dogs. Most of the immigrants are genuine and therefore, the passing of the Senate Bill 4 would imply risking the lives of millions of innocent lives who have run to seek asylum in another country which is more peaceful and better than theirs. Senate Bill 4, therefore, remains to be controversial and may have a lot of harm both to the government of Texas and locals and at the same time promote racial profiling to the people of color.

ReferencesMargulies, P. (2018). Deconstructing Sanctuary Cities: The Legality of Federal Grant Conditions That Require State and Local Cooperation on Immigration Enforcement. Wash. & Lee L. Rev., 75, 1507.

O’Connell, K. L. (2019). Schools in Sanctuary Cities: Do Sanctuary City Policies Diminish Chronic Absenteeism Among Immigrant Children? (Doctoral dissertation, Georgetown University).

Paxton, K. (2018). Providing Sanctuary to the Rule of Law: Sanctuary Policies Lawlessness, and Texas’s Senate Bill 4. Harv. J. on Legis., 55, 237.

Reed, M. E. (2019). Senate Bill 4: Police Officers’ Opinions on Texas’ Ban of Sanctuary Cities. Chicana/o Latina/o Law Review, 36(1).

Villazor, R. C., & Gulasekaram, P. (2018). The New Sanctuary and Anti-Sanctuary Movements. UCDL Rev., 52, 549.