Cambridge City Council Strengthens Sanctuary City Ordinance

The Cambridge City Council doubled down on the city’s policy barring local police collaboration with federal immigration enforcement on Monday night.

The Council voted unanimously to amend the city’s Welcoming Community Ordinance, a 40-year-old policy which limits cooperation between the Cambridge Police Department and federal law enforcement on immigration-related matters.

Under the new ordinance, officers are prevented from assisting in any Immigrations and Customs Enforcement operations in the city.

The existing ordinance prevented CPD from assisting with ICE activity, unless it was “in response to a request to assist with support services deemed necessary to ensure officer safety or to prevent a breach of the peace during a federal operation,” such as federal requests for traffic control or police escorts.

Language permitting CPD to provide escorts for federal agents or assistance with “traffic control” was struck from the ordinance, a change Councilor Jivan G. Sobrinho-Wheeler said is intended to “make clear that CPD’s only focus is on public safety.”

The amended ordinance instead says CPD officers must “perform actions and services deemed necessary to ensure the safety of all on scene.”

If CPD is dispatched to the scene of a federal immigration arrest, the amended ordinance also instructs officers to verify the identities of federal agents.

An amendment proposed in July pushed to require CPD officers to document the names and badge numbers of ICE agents. But the union representing CPD officers, the Cambridge Police Patrol Officers Association, worried that requiring officers to identify federal agents would be seen as confrontational.

Mayor E. Denise Simmons and Councilor Paul F. Toner initially refrained from supporting the amendments when they were introduced in July, citing the CPPOA’s concerns. Toner exercised his charter right in a July meeting, tabling a vote on the amendments until the Council reconvened on Monday.

In an Ordinance Committee meeting last week, City Solicitor Megan Bayer echoed the union’s worries, noting that requiring CPD to identify and document federal agents could put officers at risk of being accused of obstructing federal immigration enforcement action.

“There have been threats from the federal administration that that statute, 8 U.S.C. 1324, will be construed really broadly, and could come with criminal or civil liability towards someone who is found to be obstructing immigration action,” Bayer said in the Committee meeting.

Instead, the new ordinance asks officers to “take reasonable steps” to verify the identities of federal agents, but does not include language about documenting names or badge numbers.

Sobrinho-Wheeler first moved to strengthen the city’s ordinance in June, just days after the Department of Homeland Security named Cambridge and more than 200 other sanctuary cities nationwide on a list of jurisdictions they accused of “defying federal immigration law.”

Though the DHS list was retracted shortly after its initial publication, Cambridge joined a lawsuit against the Trump administration over the withholding of federal funds from sanctuary cities last month alongside 21 other municipalities.

“The ordinance updates are a recognition that we need to meet the moment, and also that Cambridge is not going to back down or make a deal with the Trump administration and weaken our own protections,” Sobrinho-Wheeler said. “In fact, we’re going to bolster them.”

The Welcoming Community Ordinance also bans city officials from inquiring about residents’ immigration status except as required by federal law. It also prohibits CPD from investigating or taking police action against individuals based solely on their immigration status.

—Staff writer Laurel M. Shugart can be reached at laurel.shugart@thecrimson.com. Follow them on X @laurelmshugart.