It doesn’t happen often, but local law enforcement can arrest and charge federal agents. Legal experts say there’s a moral obligation to at least try to hold federal immigration officers accountable when they violate the Constitution and the law.

In almost every instance, President Donald Trump’s administration blamed the injured and dead for the shooting within hours of the incident, raising questions about whether federal officials can fairly and objectively investigate their own. Legal experts and advocates for immigrants say this apparent lack of accountability demands that local authorities step up and exercise their power to investigate and prosecute federal agents who break state laws — from battery to murder.

“Local police and the state have gotten a free pass,” said Craig Futterman, a law professor at the University of Chicago and the co-founder and director of its Civil Rights and Police Accountability Project. “Residents have every right and should be demanding that, ‘Hey, state authorities, police, local police: Protect us. Arrest people who kill us, who batter us, who point guns at us and threaten and assault us without legal cause to do so.’”

  • Basic Glitch@sh.itjust.works
    5·
    28 days ago

    This is really awesome and needs to be spread far and wide! Definitely something that should be added to list of democracy reinforcements and priorities that we build on and strengthen if we make it through this without slipping into full authoritarian dictatorship.

    Looking over the source the article lists does seem to indicate that it boils down to the authority of the state and state autonomy vs the federal government. Unless I’m misunderstanding it, this seems to indicate there should definitely be a clear legal path to pursue (not a guarantee of a win and definitely not a guarantee of not facing pushback, but at least a legal path towards accountability) against federal corruption for blue states under attack like California, Illinois, and Minnesota. However, there unfortunately doesn’t seem to be the same kind of protection for blue cities without the back up of the state government (like Memphis, Nashville, Austin, New Orleans, etc.).

    Not much to do about it in the present, but when looking to build back better in the future it would behoove cities with political ideologies that tend to differ from their state government (blue dots or red dots), the rule of law, and democracy in general to have checks and balances like this, so that cities could be prepared to fight federal corruption as well as corruption from a state being imposed on a city.

    To be clear this is not a way for local governments to ignore the constitution or federal laws that seek to enforce or protect rights but conflict with local laws. It’s the opposite. Basically it seems like a legal path to CYA and reinforce constitutional rights for local citizens and local officials should the (formerly) unprecedented happen (a fascist tyrant somehow winds up in charge of the federal government and attempts to wield his federal power like an untouchable king).