Colorado Lawmakers Send Bill Allowing Civil Suits Against Immigration Authorities to Governor

Coloradans would be able to sue federal officials over improper immigration enforcement under a bill that cleared the Colorado Legislature on May 7.

Senate Bill 26-5 was one of the first bills introduced this year by Democrats at the Capitol. It creates a state-level cause of action against federal officials for alleged constitutional violations during immigration raids, arrests, traffic stops and warrantless entries. State officials can already be sued for civil rights violations under federal law.

The measure is a direct response to increased operations by the Department of Homeland Security and Immigration and Customs Enforcement as the agencies work to carry out President Donald Trump’s mass arrest and deportation scheme against immigrants who lack permanent legal status.

“Immigration enforcement in this country has always been problematic, but this current administration has taken it to a new level of cruelty, and that requires a new sense of urgency from us,” bill sponsor Representative Yara Zokaie said on the House floor before debate May 6.

“The Constitution protects all of us,” she said. “And when it is trampled on, there has to be accountability. In recent years, the ability to seek remedies for these violations, especially in the context of federal enforcement, has been difficult. It has left people without meaningful recourse when their rights are violated.”

The bill passed on a 41-22 vote along party lines. It passed the Senate on a 20-11 vote in late February.

It was introduced following the highly-publicized shooting deaths of two American citizens at the hands of federal agents in Minneapolis, killings that further galvanized nationwide protests against ICE and the agency’s militarized tactics — smashing windows, dragging drivers and passengers from cars, and impeding protesters from recording on their phones, among other practices.

It also comes amid increasing public backlash over conditions in ICE detention facilities, such as the one in Aurora. At least seventeen people have died in ICE custody this year, according to the American Civil Liberties Union, and a recent report from local organizations documented poor nutrition and medical care at the privately operated Aurora site.

Republicans and other bill opponents say there is a high probabilIty SB-5 will get struck down in court. Last year, the Trump administration sued Illinois over a similar law that focused on immigration arrests near courthouses.

“We have a duty to pass bills that will withstand constitutional scrutiny,” Representative. Matt Soper, a Delta Republican, said. “We should wait and see what happens in our sister states before Colorado goes marching ahead.”

But Representative Javier Mabrey, a Denver Democrat who sponsored the bill, said it was written to withstand legal challenges.

“If the court holds that qualified immunity or the supremacy clause is constitutionally required in some particular application, the statute accommodates that holding, and the rest of the bill will stand for different fact patterns,” he said. “This bill is built to survive provision by provision, and application by application, constitutional challenges.”

Democrats recently introduced another bill that was more expansive than SB-5. That measure would have let Coloradans sue any federal official, as well as state and local officials, who violated their civil rights, not just during immigration enforcement. That would have covered federal officers who appear at polling centers on Election Day, for example. The measure died during its first committee hearing earlier this week amid strong pushback from district attorneys, who said it would open their offices up to an unpredictable volume of new lawsuits.

The legislature is still considering one other immigration-related bill before the session ends May 13. House Bill 26-1276 would, among other provisions, require the state to publish redacted copies of subpoenas it receives from federal immigration authorities. It would also require the state to inform the subject of a subpoena if it fulfills the request. It is illegal in most cases for the state to provide personal data to the federal government for immigration enforcement purposes, and a state employee sued the governor last year over the governor’s direction to fulfill an ICE subpoena.

HB-1276 passed the House but still needs to be voted on by the Senate.

This story is respublished from Colorado Newsline, part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity.