“Do we have concerns that that is the poison pill for blue states for them to deny the application?” Brookline Fire Chief John Sullivan asked fellow public safety officials Thursday during a virtual meeting of the Metro Boston Homeland Security Region Jurisdictional Point of Contact Committee.
The committee, which was created to prevent and respond to terrorism and other major disasters, includes: Boston, Brookline, Cambridge, Chelsea, Everett, Quincy, Revere, Somerville, and Winthrop.
At issue is a caveat in a Department of Homeland Security application that calls for at least 10 percent of the grant allocation to be dedicated to supporting collaboration between state and local police and ICE “to identify and remove individuals who pose a threat to public safety and national security.”
Federal documents outlining the guidelines for the funding includes so-called 287(g) agreements as an example of supporting border crisis response and enforcement, which is included as a priority area for the grant money. Such agreements mean that state and local staff can be deputized to act as immigration agents. Other examples include cooperation with ICE detainers.
Failure to fulfill such priorities may result in the funding being placed on hold, according to the grant’s parameters.
A spokesperson for the Department of Homeland Security said the grant guidelines are part of the Trump’s administration effort to “make and keep America safe.”
The deadline for the funding application to be submitted to the Federal Emergency Management Agency, which is part of DHS, is Aug. 15.
“These grants will provide a change and a new way for FEMA to do business safeguarding taxpayer dollars, unlike the Biden administration that was focused on spending hundreds of millions of dollars resettling illegal aliens in our country on American taxpayers dime and housing illegal aliens,” the Homeland Security spokesperson said in an e-mail.
The statement added, “This nonsense stops here and stops immediately.”
According to Sullivan and other local safety officials on Thursday, only one governmental entity in Massachusetts has a so-called 287(g) agreement: the Massachusetts Department of Correction. (The agreement was confirmed by a DOC spokesperson.) None of the municipalities involved in the local panel that is applying for the money have such a pact.
The 287(g) program has expanded nationally in recent months, with ProPublica reporting in June that ICE has initiated 514 new agreements with local law enforcement agencies across 40 states since January.
That news outlet reported that ICE officials tout the expansion of the program — named for the section of law that allows the delegation of special powers to local officers — as a “force multiplier” to accelerate deportations and counter sanctuary policies that limit local cooperation with immigration agents.
Locally, any push for municipalities to join the program would likely be met with a fierce backlash, as the relationship between local police and federal immigration authorities is almost always framed by politics.
In Boston, for instance, there is the Trust Act, which bans Boston police from keeping immigrants in custody for possible deportation by federal officials unless a criminal warrant has been issued for the person’s arrest. City Councilors reaffirmed that city mandate in recent months.
“We have concerns if money is tied” to cooperation with federal immigration, Boston City Council President Ruthzee Louijeune told the Globe on Thursday.
Other cities involved in the local committee applying for the funds have similar restrictions for local law enforcement, including Brookline, Cambridge, Somerville, and Chelsea.
Officials in such municipalities often say that working with federal immigration authorities erodes trust in their communities, spreads fear, and makes immigrants less likely to reach out to police when crimes occur.
This would not be the first time Trump has tried to attach federal immigration cooperation with funding.
Earlier this year, Somerville and Chelsea sought to prevent efforts by the Trump administration to strip millions of dollars in funding from so-called “sanctuary cities.” Leaders of the two cities have said their sanctuary policies do not involve actively disrupting federal immigration enforcement, and do not conflict with federal law.
At Thursday’s meeting of the regional law enforcement group, state officials told local police leaders that federal authorities have conveyed that the group would still be eligible for grant funding, even without the 287(g) program, although participation in such a venture is encouraged.
Still, there were many unanswered questions, especially given that federal assurance was not provided in writing, according to officials from the Executive Office of Public Safety and Security.
“There are some concerns from the city about the language,” said Adrian Jordan, Boston’s chief of emergency preparedness. “If that is not in writing, I’m not sure how our law department is going to feel about it.
Sullivan, the Brookline chief, said it looked daunting for the consortium of communities to be in compliance with the written requirement to help ICE. But others indicated the group would move forward with the funding application.
“I don’t see any other options, chief, respectfully,” said Robert Gillan, a lieutenant with Quincy police.
There are other open questions. The Boston Regional Intelligence Center, which has historically maintained the city’s gang database and coordinated antiterrorism efforts with other law enforcement agencies, was discussed at the meeting. However, it was not immediately clear how much of the grant funding, if any, would be allocated toward BRIC, which has faced controversy in the past.
Some progressive-minded activists, calling the database inherently racist, have even called for the center’s dismantling. (BPD has reformed the way it enters names into the database in recent years.)
Messages left with Boston police and the mayor’s office regarding BRIC were not returned Thursday.
A presentation during Thursday’s meeting indicated that about $2.7 million worth of the prospective grant funding would go toward “intel and information sharing,” although it did not explicitly name BRIC.
Kade Crockford, director of technology and justice programs for the ACLU of Massachusetts, said the grant funding provisions constituted a “huge concern.” For Crockford, the Trump administration is using a “carrot and stick” approach in his attempts to convince municipalities to assist federal immigration authorities.
“They cannot coerce or force law enforcement agencies to do their dirty work for them on immigration, the 10th Amendment prevents that,” Crockford said. “They instead are turning to this carrot approach.”
“Much of what this administration does is arbitrary, capricious wielding of federal funds to punish political jurisdictions that the Trump administration disfavors,” said Crockford, who tuned into Thursday’s meeting.
Local law enforcement officials on the regional board Thursday also discussed the possibility of municipalities refusing to accept such funding if it meant having to cooperate with immigration authorities as the federal government hopes.
“There are obvious jurisdictions where the language is going to be problematic,” said Somerville Police Chief Shumeane Benford.
Danny McDonald can be reached at daniel.mcdonald@globe.com. Follow him @Danny__McDonald.
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