Tennessee House advances bill requiring sheriffs to cooperate with ICE

The Tennessee House on Monday voted 71-25 in favor of legislation to require every sheriff in the state to enter agreements with Immigration and Customs Enforcement to enforce federal immigration laws — or risk losing state funding. 

The legislation is among a slate of bills introduced by Tennessee Republicans to align with the Trump administration’s mass deportation agenda. If approved by the Senate, which is expected to take a vote this week, the bill will head to the governor’s desk for his signature.

The legislation comes amid a broader push by the Trump administration to encourage local police departments and sheriffs across the nation to enter so-called 287(g) agreements to cooperate with ICE to detain immigrants without legal status, serving as a “force multiplier” to expand the number of law enforcement officers empowered to enforce immigration laws. 

More than half of all Tennessee sheriffs have signed onto the program, some entering into more than one type of agreement. ICE offers four different types of agreements, ranging from jailhouse cooperation that allows sheriffs to check inmate immigration status to a more robust “task force” model in which local law enforcement officers actively make immigration arrests in communities. 

The legislation (SB2223/HB2219) by Sen. Jack Johnson of Franklin and Rep. Johnny Garrett of Goodlettsville — both Republicans — requires sheriffs to enter into any one of the four agreement models.

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“This bill simply strengthens our immigration enforcement through long-term strategic partnership between our sheriffs and the federal government to keep our counties and our communities safe,” said Garrett, who suggested that sheriffs who have not already entered the ICE cooperative agreements are “not abiding by the federal constitution, that’s not abiding by the Tennessee constitution, by not doing their job for law enforcement in this state.”

Sheriffs are not currently required by state or federal law to enter the agreements, which have proved financially costly and politically unpopular in some communities, including Nashville. The city suspended an agreement with ICE in 2012 after a high-profile incident drew pushback, and a costly settlement by the city: sheriff’s deputies had detained a pregnant immigrant woman and then insisted she be shackled to a bed during labor. 

“Our county sheriff’s departments are pretty busy already, but this is going to be an unfunded mandate, and going to have so many costs that are not defined in this legislation,” Rep. Gloria Johnson, a Knoxville Democrat, said. “That is the fear that I am hearing. And as someone else mentioned earlier, if something happens in that county lockup, your county is going to be liable for the cost of the lawsuit.”

Democrats noted that a $5 million grant fund created by Republican lawmakers last year had received little interest.

Just seven sheriffs and one municipal police department had sought the funding as of Feb. 1, the Lookout found. The Centralized Immigration Enforcement Bureau, a newly created state entity that distributes the grants, has declined to respond to questions about the grant program posed by the Lookout. 

The House on Monday also adopted two other measures targeting immigrants. A bill (HB1708/SB1889) by two Republicans — Rep. Kip Capley of Summertown and Sen. Brent Taylor of Memphis — requires driver’s license tests to be offered only in English after an 18-month grace period. The bill, which has drawn concern from transnational corporations doing business in Tennessee, now goes to the Senate.

A separate bill (HB1817/SB1748)  by Rep. Russell Lowell of Vonore and Sen. Janice Bowling of Tullahoma requires law enforcement to issue “out-of-service” orders to commercial driver’s license holders driving through the state who cannot speak English. That bill now also heads to the Senate.