The Palmyra Public Safety Department in rural Jefferson County wants to be the first police department in Wisconsin to allow its officers to interrogate people about their immigration status during routine police activity and make federal immigration arrests.
The Palmyra police department’s application to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement is pending, according to online records from the federal agency. ICE would train and deputize Palmyra’s local officers to work as immigration agents in the field.
The expanded duties are part of what’s called the “task force model,” a type of agreement revived by President Donald Trump’s administration that’s growing in popularity nationwide as local agencies agree to take part in his immigration crackdown.
It goes beyond other local law enforcement agencies’ cooperation agreements with ICE, which deal with people already in jail. The other models generally allow jails to hold inmates for 72 hours beyond the time state law would require them to be released to give ICE time to pick them up. Fourteen Wisconsin county sheriff’s offices have a version of those jail agreements in place.
The task force model was previously in place but came under fire for racial profiling concerns and civil rights violations. In 2012, the Obama administration suspended the task force model after, among other incidents, an investigation found that Maricopa County Sheriff’s Office deputies in Arizona were four to nine times more likely to pull over Latino drivers than non-Latino drivers.
The police department of Palmyra is seeking to work with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement to question and arrest immigrants on the federal agency’s behalf. Palmyra is located in Jefferson County, whose administrative buildings are pictured in the city of Jefferson in January.
Paul Blount, the director of public safety for the village of Palmyra, said in an email that the application will undergo local and federal review. He did not immediately offer a timeline for when the policy could be implemented.
“This is a tool, not a blanket immigration enforcement program. Our focus is on criminals who threaten public safety — not law-abiding residents,” Blount said in a statement. “The core mission of our department remains unchanged: responding to emergencies, enforcing traffic safety, and preventing crime in our community.”
Palmyra is a village of 1,700 people about 45 miles southwest of Milwaukee. It was not immediately clear how many officers were on staff. Ahead of an April 1 public safety referendum that failed, the department listed six employees – three full-time and three part-time. However, since then Chief of Police Scott Pavlock resigned.
“If approved, this program would allow our trained officers to work in closer partnership with federal authorities, gaining access to databases and resources that enhance investigations and help us combat serious crimes such as narcotics trafficking and human trafficking,” Blount said in a statement.
Blount declined a phone interview but said he may share more information publicly after the application is reviewed by at the local and federal level.
The American Civil Liberties Union of Wisconsin criticized the pending agreement Sept. 23 and said the Palmyra police department was “instituting the most aggressive 287(g) model.”
The task force “gives officers the green light to stop people they think might be immigrants on the street, question them about their citizenship status, and even take them into custody,” it said. “Instead of protecting our communities, the Palmyra Police Department is partnering hand in glove with ICE to carry out this regime’s plan to deport our immigrant neighbors and loved ones.”
The ACLU of Wisconsin on Sept. 19 sued sheriffs of five other counties and asked the state Supreme Court to rule illegal the requests from ICE to hold inmates in local jails on their behalf.
The request in Palmyra, located in Jefferson County, is notable because the Jefferson County sheriff previously said he would not seek to get involved in ICE operations outside the jail.
Sheriff Travis Maze told the Journal Sentinel in January that his department is short-staffed by 30% as it is. Maze was also concerned about federal civil rights pitfalls that can come with doing immigration work, such as potential racial-profiling lawsuits. He said he did not want to spend the time putting his staff through that training when they’re already busy.
Maze did not immediately reply to a request for comment on the pending Palmyra application.
Sophie Carson is a general assignment reporter who reports on religion and faith, immigrants and refugees and more. Contact her at scarson@gannett.com or 920-323-5758.
This article originally appeared on Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: ICE could allow Palmyra police to arrest, question immigrants in field