After touting DC as a ‘proud sanctuary city,’ Muriel Bowser now wants to work with Trump on immigration enforcement
Amid President Donald Trump’s crackdown on illegal immigration, Washington, D.C., mayor Muriel Bowser (D.) is doing an abrupt about-face from her previous views on enforcement, working to repeal a law that bars local police from assisting ICE.
Bowser is quietly proposing to overturn the sanctuary city law, which prohibits D.C. officials from inquiring about a detainee’s immigration status, transferring individuals to ICE, or allowing ICE to interview suspects in local custody without a judicial order, Axios reported.
“The mayor is asking for the repeal without fanfare, via a tucked-away provision as part of her newly released 2026 budget proposal,” according to Axios, which noted that “the D.C. Council has final say over what makes it into the budget, and some progressive members may thwart Bowser’s push.”
Bowser’s hawkishness on immigration marks a sharp change from the positions she’s held since becoming mayor in 2015.
During Trump’s first term, she tweeted that D.C. is a “proud sanctuary city” and that she is “committed to protecting the rights of all our immigrant families” in the face of what she called Trump’s “disturbing” immigration crackdown.
“The President should understand that not only are these threats cruel and antithetical to our American values, they are actually making our communities less safe by sending more residents into hiding, cut off from resources, support, and opportunity,” she said in a June 21, 2019, statement that was posted on the city’s website.
That statement has now been removed.
During Trump’s second term, his administration has ramped up deportations of illegal immigrants and crackdown on sanctuary cities nationwide.
Under border czar Tom Homan, ICE has arrested over 158,000 illegal aliens, including 189 in D.C. earlier this month. Around 75 percent of all detainees have criminal convictions or pending charges, according to the Department of Homeland Security.
Attorney General Pam Bondi in February issued a directive to halt federal funding to sanctuary cities. The Department of Justice has also sued Illinois and New York, arguing that the states’ sanctuary laws “interfere” with the Trump administration’s immigration enforcement policies.
Bowser, meanwhile, has signaled a growing willingness to work with Trump’s second administration on other issues.
The city under her leadership cleared a homeless encampment near the State Department following Trump’s call for a citywide cleanup and removed “Black Lives Matter Plaza” ahead of the nation’s 250th anniversary next year.
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