Labrador’s immigration crackdown bill clears U.S. House committee

The bill would add 12,500 additional armed federal immigration officers, penalize sanctuary cities, enlist state and local police in federal immigration enforcement, impose new criminal penalties and step up detentions and deportations.

Labrador called his bill “a first and necessary step to modernize a broken immigration system.” Democrats on the committee decried it as “President Trump’s mass deportation act.”

Labrador, who is running for governor of Idaho in 2018, has long pushed for reforms to the nation’s immigration system, but this measure is an enforcement-only bill.

Rep. Bob Goodlatte, R-Va., chair of the committee, is co-sponsoring Labrador’s bill. Betsy Russell, SR