January 31, 2017 03:05 PM UTC

Idiotic Sanctuary City Bill Not Ready For Prime Time

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• by: Colorado Pols

The Colorado Statesman’s Ernest Luning reports on a bill introduced by freshman Rep. Dave Williams, the successor in HD-15 to former Rep. Gordon “Dr. Chaps” Klingenschmitt, that claims to enact civil and criminal penalties for public officials in Colorado who creates or operates a “sanctuary jurisdiction.”

State Rep. Dave Williams said Monday he plans to introduce “The Colorado Politician Accountability Act” this week, legislation aimed at holding officials criminally liable for the “carnage” committed by some immigrants.

“As the first Latino elected to Colorado House District 15,” said Williams, who was first elected to the heavily Republican district in November, in a statement, “I think it’s important that we do all we can to uphold the rule of law and ensure all communities, regardless of race or ethnicity, are protected from dangerous policies that are forced on us by radical, out-of-touch politicians who continually sell out to an unlawful agenda that increases the number of criminals, and needless deaths among our fellow citizens.”

…The proposed legislation drew sharp criticism from state Rep. Joe Salazar, D-Thornton, who is planning to introduce legislation of his own this week called “The Ralph Carr Freedom Defense Act,” named after the Colorado governor who defended Japanese-Americans subject to internment during World War II.

“His bill is grounded in ridiculousness, surround by ignorance, covered in prejudice and overall is tone-deaf to what is happening in our country,” Salazar told The Statesman. “If Rep. Williams wants to serve as a human dogwhistle for Trump, I imagine his time as a legislator will be considered wasted.” [Pols emphasis]

So there are two major effects of this legislation if it were to become law: allowing* (see below) civil suits against government officials who create “sanctuary jurisdictions,” and creating the new class 4 felony charge of “rendering assistance to an illegal alien through a sanctuary jurisdiction.” Now obviously, anyone can write a bill establishing new crimes–but in the case of civil suits against government officials, that’s another matter entirely. Public officials are immune from most civil lawsuits under the Colorado Governmental Immunity Act. The bill says officials can’t claim immunity in “sanctuary jurisdiction” cases, but that would be vigorously challenged in court.

None of which really matters anyway, since this bill doesn’t have a hope in hell of passage. Some of our longtime readers will recall Rep. Williams’ checkered history in El Paso County politics, including an ill-fated run for El Paso County GOP chair that ended in defeat after local Republicans judged Williams to be too homophobic and generally unpleasant even for them. As you can read above, Williams trades heavily on his own Latino heritage to justify his sponsorship of one of the uglier pieces of anti-immigration legislation we’ll see in Colorado this year.

Some people, we suppose, just have a lot to “prove.”