Wisconsin’s Liberal Leaders Stand Against the Rule of Law

Wisconsin: The Epicenter of Trump Resistance

Wisconsin is apparently now the epicenter of resistance to President Trump’s illegal immigration policy; the Constitution, federalism, and the Rule of Law be damned.

Just in the past three weeks, Governor Tony Evers’ Department of Administration ordered all state employees to obstruct Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) investigations, a Milwaukee County Circuit Court judge was arrested for helping a criminal defendant evade ICE arrest, and the Dane County Sheriff ignored an ICE hold and refused to share with federal agents the GPS location of a violent thug who had just been released from jail.

Willmar Ray Cabarcas-Polo was charged with pistol-whipping and nearly killing a man after an indoor soccer match in Fitchburg last month but fled to Texas. He was extradited back to Wisconsin last week but was allowed to post bail and leave the Dane County Jail despite an ICE detainer request.

After his arrest, ICE asked the Dane County Sheriff’s Office to share the GPS location of Cabarcas-Polo’s electronic monitoring bracelet to help agents quickly and safely arrest him, but Dane County Sheriff Kalvin Barrett refused, telling the agents they needed a warrant to fulfill such a request. In spite of this obstruction, ICE agents arrested Cabarcas-Polo at his home a day after his release.

As nauseating as the Dane County Sheriff’s Office’s behavior was, it pales in comparison to the crimes Milwaukee County Judge Hannah Dugan committed in helping Eduardo Flores-Ruiz run away from ICE agents who arrived at her courtroom. Flores-Ruiz—who is charged with punching a man 30 times and then beating a woman who tried to pull him away—was the subject of an ICE arrest warrant, but instead of turning him over to agents, Dugan sent them away while she shuttled Flores-Ruiz through her jury room and out a back door with the intent of helping him escape.

This shameful incident occurred the same day Governor Tony Evers’ Department of Administration issued a memo to all state employees explicitly instructing them to do their best to impede ICE agents—even those with valid arrest warrants—who show up at state offices.

“Do not answer questions, including when an agent asks about someone you know or presents a warrant with an individual name,” the memo orders. “Do not give your consent for the agent to enter into a non-public area.”

State employees must always “call [their] Office of Legal Counsel and speak directly with an attorney” when an ICE agent arrives but, critically, “if [they] do not reach an attorney, [they are to] ask the agent to come back at another time.

“This applies regardless of whether or not the agent has presented a judicial or administrative warrant.”

In other words, state employees must ignore said warrants and shoo ICE agents away if they are unable to reach an attorney. In case there is any confusion, no other criminal defendant in any jurisdiction in America may delay their arrest until a coworker is able to speak with their company’s lawyer.

This is a direct order to obstruct ICE investigations, and the memo even goes so far as to hilariously instruct state employees to tell ICE agents “to have a seat in a public area, ideally in a space that is separate from the rest of the office, such as an enclosed waiting room.”

ICE agents, unlike any other law enforcement officers in America, will have to wait and take a number before enforcing a valid warrant.

The law doesn’t work like that, and the Constitution’s system of federalism doesn’t allow it. While states do have a level of autonomy from the federal government, Article VI, Clause 2 makes it abundantly clear that federal law is the supreme law of the land.

Known as the “Supremacy Clause,” it provides that “This Constitution, and the Laws of the United States which shall be made in Pursuance thereof…under the Authority of the United States, shall be the supreme Law of the Land; and the Judges in every State shall be bound thereby, any Thing in the Constitution or Laws of any State to the Contrary notwithstanding.”

18 US Code § 1505—a law of the United States made in pursuance of the constitution—could not possibly be more direct: Anyone who “influences, obstructs, or impedes or endeavors to influence, obstruct, or impede the due and proper administration of the law under which any pending proceeding is being had before any department or agency of the United States” is subject to five years in federal prison.

Judge Dugan has already been criminally charged for her mistaken and dangerous belief that her own personal convictions trump the federal law and the proper enforcement of it. Could Sheriff Barrett and Governor Evers (or whomever actually wrote the memo) be next?

It would be a far more difficult case to make, but one could theoretically make it: Their actions are designed to impede and obstruct the due and proper administration of America’s immigration law, despite their own personal opposition to said administration.

If governors, sheriffs, and judges are empowered to ignore or even openly defy federal law when they politically or personally despise the people enforcing it, the entire system of federalism evaporates, and the proper distribution of legal authority becomes impossible.

Tony Evers isn’t just a governor, Hannah Dugan isn’t just a judge, Kalvin Barrett isn’t just a sheriff; they are also citizens of the United States, bound to the same laws as every other citizen. They enjoy special privileges and powers that their positions afford them, but when they use these powers and privileges to actively obstruct the enforcement of federal law, they must be treated as any other citizen who does so. In fact, they must be held to an even higher standard because of the privileges and powers entrusted to them.

If they are unworthy of these privileges and powers—as all three of them have proven to be over the past three weeks—then they must be subject to the consequences of their actions.

The Constitution, federalism, and Rule of Law itself demand it.