Governor Glenn Youngkin (R-VA) issued an executive order to direct the state’s law enforcement entities to cooperate with Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).
The order seeks to “improve the safety of all Virginians by maximizing our collaboration with the federal government to enforce immigration law in the Commonwealth of Virginia and using all available methods to facilitate the arrest and deportation of inadmissible and removable criminal illegal immigrants.”
“Virginia is not a sanctuary state,” the order declares. “A commitment to public safety demands that the Commonwealth recognize that the nexus between illegal immigration and dangerous criminal activity is real, particularly in an era marked by rising transnational criminal organizations, criminal street gangs, human trafficking, the distribution of illegal narcotics including fentanyl, and crimes of violence linked to these clear and emerging threats.”
The order further directs the “Secretary of Public Safety & Homeland Security to request a certification from local and regional jail authorities confirming their full cooperation with ICE and that they will cooperate with the Section 287(g) VSP Task Force.”
“As Governor, protecting our citizens is my foremost responsibility and today we are taking action that will make Virginia safer by removing dangerous criminal illegal immigrants from our Commonwealth,” Youngkin said in a statement. “This order will allow Virginia State Police and the Department of Corrections to partner with President Trump’s administration on federal immigration enforcement. Dangerous criminal illegal immigrants should not be let back into our communities to assault, rape and murder. They should be sent back where they came from.”
