California Sen. Alex Padilla (D) said Sunday the state had “no obligation” to help President-elect Donald Trump enact his mass deportation plans, saying local officials will instead work to support migrants and undocumented immigrants.
Padilla spoke with CBS News’ Major Garrett, who asked the lawmaker about recent remarks by Trump’s pick to become the nation’s border czar, Tom Homan. Homan recently told Democratic governors to “get the hell out of the way,” warning of retribution if officials moved to resist the upcoming Trump administration.
“Look, I think there’s a lot of reason for concern of the second Trump administration, if the first administration is any indicator,” Padilla said Sunday, pointing to the president-elect’s threats to block wildfire funding from the state. “Donald Trump has made it no secret that he has it in for California, whether it’s the withholding of disaster funds … simply because it’s a state that did not vote for him in the presidential election.”
“We’re trying to inoculate ourselves from those types of threats.”
Padilla went on to say California had no plans to use its state and local resources to assist Immigration and Customs Enforcement operations and “do the federal government’s job for them.”
“No state government, not Texas, not California, not any state in the nation, has a constitutional authority to impose federal immigration law,” he added. “That is the responsibility of the federal government.”
Instead, Padilla said, state officials would work to embrace the region’s diversity and “assist families against the threats of the Trump administration.”
“The last thing you want to do is have immigrants who are victims of crime afraid to come forward to report that crime,” the senator said. “The last thing you want is immigrants who may be witnesses to crime to be afraid to come forward and share any information that they have in the investigation and prosecution of crimes.”
“Let the federal government do the federal government’s job, but have state and local officials do the state and local officials’ job,” he went on. “There doesn’t have to be a conflict, unless that’s what Trump wants.”