Patricia Ritchie, wearing blue, a Mexican American, told lawmakers at a Iowa House subcommittee Feb. 20, 2025 that a bill requiring Iowa law enforcement agencies participate in U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement programs will hurt relationships between Latino Iowans and police. (Photo by Robin Opsahl/Iowa Capital Dispatch)
Despite outcry from immigrant rights groups and legal concerns about due process, Iowa lawmakers gave initial approval Thursday to a measure that would require every law enforcement agency in Iowa to enter agreements with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) for immigration law enforcement efforts.
House Study Bill 187 would require all Iowa law enforcement agencies to enter written memorandums of agreement with ICE by Jan. 1, 2026 to participate in immigration enforcement programs. It requires Iowa law enforcement agencies to enter agreements specifically for the jail enforcement model, which allows law enforcement to identify and process individuals based on their citizenship status when in custody, and also for the warrant service officer program, which permits state and local officers to serve and execute administrative warrants for jailed individuals identified as removable under immigration law.
Speakers with the Iowa Migrant Movement for Justice and other advocates said the measure will hurt Latino and immigrant communities across the state, making people less likely to bring public safety issues to law enforcement’s attention. Several individuals said Reps. Skyler Wheeler and Steven Holt, the two Republicans on the subcommittee who signed off of the measure, were “xenophobic” and “hateful” for passing the measure.
Several opponents said the measure will lead to an increase in racial profiling. Dr. Tom Palmer, a Quaker pastor, said his daughter is married to a Guatemalan immigrant who is a U.S. citizen. When his daughter and son-in-law were on their honeymoon, they were stopped by highway patrol officers “because he was brown,” Palmer said.
“They insisted they get out, they separated them, interrogated them, searched their car without a warrant, without any due process,” Palmer said. “This bill would encourage more of this kind of behavior from our law enforcement departments. Warrants for known criminals should be properly and legally obtained by ICE. This is not the work of our local police.”
Patricia Ritchie, a Mexican-American combat veteran, said supporters of the measure “want law enforcement to become ICE agents,” but that the measure will have major negative consequences for communities across the state.
“Unfunded mandates are stressful and will cause even more harm to the community relationship between our Latinos and our law enforcement, please consider that,” Ritchie said. “And understand that I respect your position, but at the same time, you have to understand that our relationships in order to work with others, will be affected by the decision that you make.”
The bill also requires law enforcement agencies to comply with these provisions even if funding for the mandate is not provided or specified.
Mike Tupper, a recently retired law enforcement officer from Marshalltown, said local law enforcement across the state have a long-standing history of working with federal partners to enforce public safety measures, but the bill would hurt Iowa police forces that are already struggling.
“It creates unfunded mandates,” Tupper said. “It creates unnecessary burdens on already-strained resources. I’m willing to bet that most law enforcement agencies in the state are hiring right now. They don’t have time for an additional mission, and quite frankly, it’s healthier for our communities if we maintain a healthy separation between federal immigration enforcement and local law enforcement.”
Pete McRoberts with the American Civil Liberties Union of Iowa said there are currently 157 jurisdictions in the country that have memorandums in place with ICE as would be mandated under the bill — leading to the question, “out of the thousands of communities in the country, why so few have done this?”
McRoberts said the reason the measure has not been adopted widely by local law enforcement agencies is because of concerns about due process considerations, in granting people the right to go through the legal process and to defend themselves before receiving punishments. While removing a person under ICE’s system of civil deportations is legal under federal immigration law, that does not mitigate local law enforcement’s due process obligations to allow a person to go before a judge.
“The problem is that local law enforcement office is on the hook for those due process violations,” McRoberts said. “There’s nothing in the (memorandum) sample that ICE distributes to law enforcement offices that addresses that. At best, ICE says, in their own words, ‘everyone has afforded due process,’ but that’s not the judicial due process — that’s within the branch, the executive branch itself.”
Wheeler, R-Hull, said though there were many people speaking against the measure who attended the meeting, there were two individuals who were not able to attend — Sarah Root and Molly Tibbetts, two Iowans who were killed by undocumented immigrants.
“I’m sure they’d have a few things to say if they could be here today,” Wheeler said. “… Our job is to keep our citizens safe. They come first.”
Holt said he was always amazed by advocates who try to “erase” the difference between legal and illegal immigration — and said the bill was specifically a way to identify and remove undocumented immigrants in the U.S. who commit crimes.
“While many came into our country illegally, came here for a better life, and they’re law-abiding citizens otherwise in our communities, we also know there are criminals in our communities all across the nation, who came across the border illegally, including right here in Iowa,” Holt said. He said the state needs to “have complete cooperation between local, state and federal authorities as we work to remove these dangerous individuals from our communities and make everyone, immigrant and citizen, safe.”