AUSTIN, Texas — On Tuesday, the Texas Senate approved a bill requiring deputies in the state’s larger counties to help federal authorities with immigration enforcement.
While state lawmakers say the goal is to get criminals out of Texas communities, some sheriff’s departments say it is an unfunded mandate.
Under Senate Bill 8, the sheriff’s offices in counties with a population of 100,000 or more would have to join Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s 287-G program. They’ll help ICE identify people who are here illegally and remove them.
“This bill is addressing the atrocities committed by criminal aliens through open border policies under the prior administration,” said Sen. Charles Schwertner (R-Georgetown), who authored the bill. “We need to, as a state, be much better at identifying, detaining, prosecuting, and deporting criminal aliens from Texas and the United States as quickly as possible.”
The 287-G program trains state and local police in federal immigration enforcement.
The program includes three models: a jail model where authorities work to identify and remove those in the country illegally with criminal or pending criminal charges that are currently in jail, a warrant program where local law enforcement helps serve warrants on those in the country illegally that are in prison, and a task force model, which ICE describes as a “force multiplier” as local law enforcement join ICE on some of their routine immigration enforcement duties.
“This bill helps address the ongoing issue of criminal aliens being arrested and potentially let go due to the arresting entity’s lack of knowledge of that individual,” Schwertner said.
Sen. Juan “Chuy” Hinojosa (D-McAllen) said he had no problem when someone is arrested and processed into jail, and authorities check to see if they are in the country illegally, but he expressed concern about whether local officers and deputies had the authority to ask for a citizenship document to show that the person is legal in the United States during a traffic stop.
“It’s just not a random sheriff’s deputy. The individuals designated within that sheriff’s department are the participating designees for that sheriff’s department,” Schwertner said. “They’ll always be accompanied or at least working in partnership with immigration officials.”
SB 8 also includes a state-funded grant program to help counties with less than a million people pay for the training. The five Texas counties over one million population thresholds would have to pay for it themselves.
“There’s a difference between being a partner and being together on a task force,” Hinojosa said. “They’ll be proper oversight, but if they’re sitting back in the office and calling that oversight while you allow local police departments or the local deputy sheriff deputy sheriffs to enforce immigration laws, I don’t think they would have anywhere near the amount of training that our immigration law enforcement officers have.”
Law enforcement and some democratic state lawmakers said this would divert deputies from their day-to-day duties, which is a challenge for departments with limited resources.
“The state and county are not the federal government that pays for the personnel costs of immigration enforcement, and under the 287 statute, the federal government cannot even reimburse us for those personnel costs,” Sen. Molly Cook (D-Houston) said. “287-G has always been a voluntary program. Even the federal government does not make it mandatory. Forcing the state and local law enforcement to pay for and enforce this program diverts their resources from solving crimes.”
Cook said she worried that forcing local law enforcement to participate in immigration operations would substantially harm the relationship between the departments and community members and push victims and witnesses into the shadows because they will not trust law enforcement.
“I can tell you from a nursing perspective, it’s painful to see care delayed or care never even saw it because people are so afraid just to be out. Good people will not report crimes out of fear about their or someone else’s immigration status,” Cook said. “Driving victims and witnesses into the shadows undermines public safety.”
There are also concerns about whether or not agencies can afford the training and participation in the program. Amendments that would have provided grant estimates so agencies would know how much of the costs associated with the program would be covered by the grants prior to entering the program were shot down on the floor.
“This is an unfunded mandate on our cities,” Sen. Roland Guttierez (D-San Antonio) said. “I don’t want murderers to be deported. I want them to go to prison. That’s where I want murderers. I want them to go to prison.”
The bill gives the Texas Attorney General the authority to take legal action against counties that don’t comply by Dec. 1, 2026. Based on 2020 census data, 40 Texas counties exceed the 100,000 threshold and would have to join the program if the bill passes.
Forty-five Texas counties, including Burnet and Fayette counties in Central Texas, are already participating in the program. The bill now heads to the House for consideration.