Rice County and ICE
This is Part 2 of a 5-part article series drawn from my March Fireside Chat. Listen to the full fireside chat at samuelftemple.com/twoeconomies
One of the two issues that has driven unusual civic engagement in Faribault this winter is Rice County's unclear messaging on their policies regarding ICE.
My request to the County has been simple: transparency. The County has done little to publicly clarify how they do or do not communicate with ICE, what local policies direct them to do so, on whose authority those policies were put in place, and what community members can expect if they are booked in the county jail.
The specific concern I raised to the County Board is the Sheriff department's policy of notifying ICE when they have arrested someone on ICE's detainer list.
Briefly, there are two types of detainers. An administrative detainer is a request from ICE to hold someone in jail until ICE is available to grab them; it is not a court order, not a judicial warrant. It does not mean someone has been found guilty of a crime. It does not require a conviction. ICE can issue them for anyone, even people who have never been charged with a crime of any kind. They have put detainers out for U.S. citizens.
A judicial warrant, by contrast, has been reviewed and signed by a judge. It still doesn’t mean someone is guilty of a crime. But it raises the warrant closer to the standard of scrutiny of a typical criminal warrant-- which, again, this is not.
Those booked in the County Jail are not inherently criminals. We are all innocent until proven guilty and deserve our day in court.
If Rice County clarified its policy to only honor judicial warrants, residents would be more trusting of local law enforcement. Right now, their policy is not clear and has not been thoroughly communicated to the public. There would be clear expectations of what local justice looks like. Nothing prevents the County from making this administrative decision today. Evidence shows that when ICE operates without administrative assistance from local law enforcement, crimes are reported more readily, witnesses feel safer speaking up, and trust in local law enforcement increases. That is the public safety argument.
There is also a liability argument. When the County assists in apprehensions by honoring detainers, it carries liability for ICE's errors. Doing so exposes taxpayers to costly lawsuits and settlements; Counties have had to pay out hundreds of millions of dollars in such cases. These cases divert staff time and public resources away from local priorities. It makes the community less safe while asking the public to accept more risk. It’s simply bad policy that exposes me and you to massive financial risk as taxpayers.
Thus far, I have not seen an improvement in the County's transparency on these issues. I have gotten different answers from different people in county government when asked about specific policies. There is more work to do here.
I want to thank the residents who have spoken publicly about these concerns. That is not an easy thing to do. Many of the people speaking up have far less institutional protection than the people listening to them from the dais. They have shown courage, discipline, and care for their neighbors. They have taken personal risks to make sure something necessary gets said. I am grateful for that.
I wish more of our local elected leaders would match the courage shown by the people making their voices heard — neighbors serving their community at real personal risk.
If you want to stay informed on this and other local issues, sign up for updates at samuelftemple.com. If you'd like to get involved in nonpartisan organizing work in Faribault, reach out through the website. You don't have to know everything to get started. You already have the power needed to make change. You just have to be brave enough to use it.
— Sam Temple
