Plans to Penalize L.A. on Sanctuary Issue Questioned

Minutes after the Los Angeles City Council voted to declare Los Angeles a “city of sanctuary” for Central American refugees last Wednesday, Harold Ezell, Western regional commissioner of the Immigration and Naturalization Service, angrily threatened to seek federal legislation that would cut back federal funds to the city as punishment.

Specifically, he told The Times later, he will seek congressional sponsors for such legislation while he is in Washington this week. He added that he had already assigned a regional INS counsel to investigate the possibility of bringing a federal lawsuit against the City Council for passing the largely symbolic resolution.

However, Washington legislators who, Ezell said, might sponsor such legislation indicated Monday that they are unlikely to do so. Also, Ezell’s boss, national INS Commissioner Alan Nelson, said in a telephone interview that, while he is interested in “looking into” Ezell’s ideas, more groundwork is needed before any decision is made to pursue them.

‘Acting Irrationally’

“We will look into--and I want to emphasize look into--what federal options are available,” Nelson said. “He (Ezell) properly represented the kind of concerns we had and the fact that we will be looking at these other items (actions against the City Council) . . . but we obviously don’t want to be guilty of doing what we’ve criticized other people of doing: acting irrationally.”

He said he plans to have INS attorneys in Washington study the Los Angeles resolution carefully “to look into what impact it may have on federal law and what action is to be pursued.”

However, he said, he knows of no way in which INS operations have been hampered by similar declarations of sanctuary in other cities, including Chicago and New York.

Ezell told The Times that he plans to ask U.S. Sen. Alan K. Simpson (R-Wyo.) and Rep. Daniel E. Lungren (R-Long Beach) to sponsor legislation that would cut back federal funds to the city as a reprisal for its sanctuary resolution.

“I think it is ridiculous to thumb your nose at the federal government with one hand and then put your other hand out for a check,” he said. “That’s not the American way.”

Both lawmakers are strong allies of the INS in the battle to obtain tough reform immigration laws. However, Lungren and a spokesperson for Simpson said Monday that they are unlikely to respond affirmatively to Ezell’s request.

Mary Kay Hill, press secretary to Simpson, said the senator has independently considered two forms of similar legislation in recent weeks in response to a growing number of cities and other local governing bodies that have declared sanctuaries for Central American immigrants who are considered illegal aliens by the federal government and refugees by a variety of church and immigrants’ rights advocates.

One form of legislation, she explained, would amend Simpson’s existing bill to make it illegal for employers to hire illegal aliens. Such an amendment would deny to cities that have declared themselves sanctuaries any reimbursements they might otherwise get from the federal government for services to illegal aliens who would become legal residents under the bill.

However, that bill has already passed the Senate and is now beyond Simpson’s reach.

Possible Alternative

A second possible step, she explained, would amend a bill currently in the Senate that allots funds to cities as reimbursement for welfare-related costs that they incur in resettling new refugees admitted legally to the United States.

“Sen. Simpson has a deep, sincere belief that federal funding should not be available to those communities (that declare sanctuary),” she said. But, she said, the bill is not appropriate for carrying out Ezell’s aims because it deals with refugees and not illegal aliens. She said that “Simpson would probably agree with (Ezell) in theory, but the question is, practically speaking, how you can apply it?”

In the House, where immigration reform legislation is still pending, Lungren said he will be “happy to listen. But I would not be very positive to it because what it would do would be to punish the people of Los Angeles for the inane actions of the City Council of Los Angeles.”

The sanctuary resolution, which passed the council by a vote of 8 to 6, is considered an advisory motion, not a law. Therefore, Mayor Tom Bradley’s approval is not required.