Mayor Mike Johnston of Denver struck a defiant tone after President Trump was re-elected, vowing to risk jail time to prevent unlawful mass deportations.
He was more measured on Wednesday, at a hearing of the House Oversight Committee, as he and three other big-city mayors took criticism and barbed questions from a panel of hostile Republican lawmakers about whether their policies had made their cities havens for migrant criminals.
Introducing himself at the session as “a man of faith,” the mayor, a Democrat, defended his 715,000-person city’s welcoming posture toward migrants, whom he referred to as “newcomers.” But he also insisted that local law enforcement officers had cooperated with the Trump administration by providing immigration authorities with information that allowed them to arrest migrants being held in Denver jails.
“We do coordinate with ICE,” he told Republicans, referring to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement. He said Denver had honored 1,226 of the agency’s “detainer requests,” which ask for notification as early as possible before the release of what ICE calls “a removable alien.”
Republicans were not buying Mr. Johnston’s portrayal. Some of his fiercest critics came from his own state, reflecting the growing gulf between Colorado’s urban liberal politicians and its suburban and rural Republicans.
Representative Gabe Evans, a Republican who represents the Denver suburbs, reeled off crime and overdose numbers to rebut Mr. Johnston’s argument that crime was falling in Denver despite an influx of migrants.
Representative Jeff Crank, a Republican from Colorado Springs, said Denver’s procedure for handing over immigrants detained in its jail to federal agents was slipshod and put officers at risk.
And Representative Lauren Boebert, a conservative firebrand who represents a largely rural area on the plains east of Denver, criticized an ordinance that limits how city officials interact with immigration officers. In a rapid series of questions, she tried to goad Mr. Johnston into calling for the repeal of a Colorado law that forbids local law enforcement from making immigration arrests.
“Mr. Mayor, yes or no?” she asked. “Will you join me?”
He demurred.
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