Updated April 28, 2025 at 7:45 PM EDT
WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump signed an executive order on Monday aimed at identifying and potentially cutting off federal funds to sanctuary cities, part of a broader effort to target jurisdictions that limit their cooperation with immigration authorities.
The executive order directs the Departments of Justice and Homeland Security to identify jurisdictions where local enforcement has declined to cooperate with the Trump administration's immigration crackdown.
"It's quite simple," said White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt during a press briefing on Monday morning. "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."
The order instructs those two agencies to create "proper eligibility verification" systems in sanctuary cities to stop migrants in the country illegally from receiving federal funds including in-state tuition and other public benefits.
The move sets the stage for more federal lawsuits against cities, states and counties that don't fully cooperate with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement. Those sanctuary jurisdictions argue that collaborating with ICE would drain their resources, and undermine trust between police and immigrant communities.
"We stand together in solidarity with our immigrant families," wrote Keith Wilson, the mayor of Portland, OR, in a letter to the city council earlier this year, promising the city would try to "keep undocumented families safe by slowing or stopping cooperation with overreaching federal immigration enforcement."
The Trump administration has previously tried to withhold funding from sanctuary cities and states. During President Trump's first term, the Justice Department tried to withhold funding from several jurisdictions — but they fought back, and were often able to defeat those efforts in court.
Last week, a federal judge blocked the administration's latest effort to withhold funding from 16 jurisdictions, including San Francisco, Portland, Seattle, Minneapolis, St. Paul and New Haven.
"Here we are again," wrote U.S. District Judge William Orrick in San Francisco, who found that the Trump administration's actions were likely unconstitutional and granted a preliminary injunction.
"The threat to withhold funding causes them irreparable injury in the form of budgetary uncertainty, deprivation of constitutional rights, and undermining trust between the Cities and Counties and the communities they serve," Orrick wrote.
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