Under the Constitution, state and local governments have every right to refuse to help enforce federal law. In cases like Printz v. United States (1997) and New York v. United States (1992), the Supreme Court has ruled that the Tenth Amendment forbids federal “commandeering” of state governments to help enforce federal law. Most of the support for this anti-commandeering principle came from conservative justices such as the late Antonin Scalia, who wrote the majority opinion in Printz.

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Few if any federal grants to state and local governments are conditioned on cooperation with federal deportation efforts. The Supreme Court has long ruled that conditions on federal grants to state and local governments are not enforceable unless they are “unambiguously” stated in the text of the law “so that the States can knowingly decide whether or not to accept those funds.” In ambiguous cases, courts must assume that state and local governments are not required to meet the condition in question. In sum, the Trump administration can’t cut off any federal grants to sanctuary cities unless it can show that those grants were clearly conditioned on cooperation with federal deportation policies.

The looming fight over sanctuary cities is an example of how federalism and constitutional limitations on federal power can sometimes protect vulnerable minorities – in this case undocumented immigrants. States and localities have a reputation for being enemies of minority rights, while the federal government is seen as their protector. That has often been true historically. But sometimes the situation is reversed – a pattern that has become more common in recent years.

Many deportation advocates claim it is essential to enforce the law against all violators. But the vast majority of Americans have violated the law at some point in their lives, and few truly believe that all lawbreaking should be punished, regardless of the nature of the law in question or the reason for the violation. And few have more defensible reasons for violating law than undocumented migrants whose only other option is a lifetime of Third World poverty and oppression. In any event, even if there is an obligation to enforce a particular law, it does not follow that the duty falls on state and local governments.

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At this point, it is not yet clear how far Trump intends to push his deportation agenda. Election exit polls suggest that mass deportation is not a popular policy, with 70% of the public believing that undocumented migrants working in the US should be offered permanent residency, and only 25% indicating they should be deported. The spectacle of the federal government trying to deport large numbers of people in the face of local resistance is unlikely to make good PR for the Trump administration. Perhaps that will lead them to scale back their ambitions.

Should Trump choose to pursue a policy of mass deportation regardless of the potential downsides, sanctuary cities can refuse to cooperate with it. And they will have the Constitution on their side.