[M]ontpelier’s city council has voted to make Vermont’s capital a sanctuary city.
Mayor John Hollar and the council unanimously approved a resolution Wednesday authorizing the city to adopt policies that would protect undocumented immigrants from deportation. Under the resolution, local police would not be allowed to enforce federal immigration laws.
Montpelier becomes the third Vermont city to seek sanctuary city status since Donald Trump, who said during his campaign he would deport millions of immigrants and cut off federal funding to sanctuary cities, was elected president.
Burlington voted Monday to continue the city’s practice of not asking about immigration status when people seek municipal services. Winooski, the most diverse city in the state, will likely vote in January to become a sanctuary city, according to mayor Seth Leonard.
“We have many people here who have migrated to the United states from different places,” Leonard said. “We as a city do not ask people currently in any format what their immigration status is. What we’re doing with the sanctuary city … is making sure that that’s really clear to all of our residents.”
Leonard said the city has identified up to $22,000 in federal funding it may lose if Trump makes good on his plan to defund sanctuary cities. But he said it could take a long time to lose that money because there’s no “magic faucet that somebody just turns the handle on that causes funds to go away.”
In Montpelier, Hollar said the city already does not enforce federal immigration policies, and the city council’s vote is unlikely to sway national policies, but “at some point I think it’s important to stand up for principles regardless of the consequences.”
Montpelier has about 8,000 people, according to the U.S. Census Bureau, and 95 percent of residents identified as white as of 2014. The largest minority group, making up 2 percent of the population, are people who identify as African American, and about 1 percent identify as Hispanic or Latino.
“I wanted to have Montpelier be on record that we are a city that values diversity and welcomes immigrants and we should not be in the business of making determinations about immigrant status,” Hollar said.
Larger sanctuary cities would engage in a “significant national conversation” if the federal government tried to take away their funding, Hollar said. Montpelier, however, does not receive much federal funding.
A draft version of the resolution says Montpelier “has a long and proud tradition of being a community that welcomes immigrants and refugees as ‘New Americans’ and valued members of our community” and “federal agencies have no authority to require local enforcement of immigration policy.”
The resolution says the city “has no formal existing agreements to enforce immigration policy” and “does not inquire about a resident’s immigration status in providing municipal services or in the course of law enforcement.”
The resolution also says the city will not respond to requests from a state or federal agency “that requires the identification of a resident’s immigration status or religious affiliation.”
Anne Watson, a city councilor, said she asked for the council to add “religious affiliation” to the resolution “because of the national discussion regarding a Muslim registry.”
