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Chelsea, Somerville ask court to halt Trump’s efforts to defund them over ‘sanctuary’ status
Lawyers for Chelsea and Somerville say that the Trump administration is unconstitutionally threatening funding for road safety, education and more.
Chelsea and Somerville both asked a federal court this week to block the Trump administration’s attempts to strip funding from the cities over their immigration enforcement policies.
The two cities sued the federal government earlier this year in a challenge to the constitutionality of the administration’s actions. A motion filed Tuesday seeks an injunction to prevent the administration from withholding funds while the lawsuit proceeds.
Since returning to office, President Donald Trump has increasingly targeted local jurisdictions with “sanctuary” policies. There is no singular legal definition of what constitutes a so-called sanctuary jurisdiction, but the term generally refers to places that place legal limits on cooperation between local law enforcement and federal immigration authorities.
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Somerville has called itself a “welcoming community” since 1987, and Chelsea adopted an official “sanctuary city” label in 2007. In both places, government officials and law enforcement do not routinely inquire about immigration statuses of residents. Both cities also generally limit local officials from participating in federal immigration enforcement for purely civil violations.
These policies do not interfere with immigration enforcement and do not prohibit local police from cooperating with federal immigration authorities on matters like criminal investigations or serious threats to public safety, according to lawyers representing Somerville and Chelsea.
Similar policies are on the books in many Massachusetts communities, where leaders argue that they increase public safety by bolstering trust between residents and law enforcement. Detractors say sanctuary policies shield criminals from authorities and endanger residents.
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Last week, Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem said she was putting sanctuary jurisdiction “on notice” and accused them of breaking the law. Noem released a list of states, counties, and municipalities across the country that the federal government identified as sanctuary jurisdictions. This list included the entire state of Massachusetts and multiple cities, including both Chelsea and Somerville.
The move prompted anger from local officials around the country who say that their communities have no business being labeled as sanctuary jurisdictions. That pushback was apparently enough for DHS to take the list down from the internet. Noem’s memo announcing the list can still be accessed, but attempts to view the list itself gives users a “page not found” error message as of the time of publication.
The list was just the latest in a series of escalations against “sanctuary” jurisdictions, following multiple executive orders that included threats to cut off federal funding. San Francisco and other municipalities similarly sued the Trump administration over the threats earlier this year, and a judge has ruled in their favor.
Federal immigration authorities appear to be increasingly focused on Massachusetts. Earlier this week, Officials from ICE and other agencies announced that a monthlong operation in the state resulted in the arrests of almost 1,500 people. It was the largest ICE operation ever, officials told Fox News.
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Officials touted the alleged murders, rapists, and drug traffickers they apprehended, but did not release the identities of any of those individuals. Of those arrested, less than 60% had criminal charges against them, according to figures publicized by ICE. One of those who did not was an 18-year-old Milford student. During a press conference, authorities blamed sanctuary policies for making their work more difficult.
‘No good reason’
Chelsea and Somerville, which are being represented in court by Lawyers for Civil Rights, argue that the Trump administration is violating the Constitution in multiple ways: attempting to withhold Congressionally allocated funds, attempting to commandeer local resources, and infringing on due process.
“Chelsea will not be bullied or intimidated into enforcing federal immigration laws, and we will not allow federal policies to dictate how we care for people that call Chelsea home,” City Manager Fidel Maltez said in a statement.
The stakes are high, as both cities rely on substantial federal funding for things like homelessness prevention, reducing tobacco use, education, and downtown revitalization. Chelsea received about $14.5 million in federal funding during fiscal year 2024, and Somerville received about $19.4 million, according to court documents. Most of these funds are reimbursement-based, meaning that the cities spend money on services first and then rely on the federal government to reimburse them.
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“Defendants’ actions place Plaintiffs in an untenable position: they must either expend millions of dollars on public services with no assurances the federal government will reimburse them; or they must stop providing needed services to their residents,” lawyers for Chelsea and Somerville wrote in court documents.
The Trump administration is attaching stipulations to grant funding in an attempt to coerce these cities into changing their policies, according to court documents. For example, a $4 million grant awarded to Somerville to improve road safety now has extra strings attached to it that run counter to the city’s existing laws. This represents an “impossible choice” for local officials, they argued.
“Our residents know that our community is safer when police focus on preventing crime rather than raiding the local sandwich shop. We know that stripping cities of their rights erodes everyone’s rights. We know that spreading hate and lies about an entire group of people has historically led to harm and injustice for all,” Somerville Mayor Katjana Ballantyne said in a statement. “And we know that withholding federal funding for no good reason threatens the health and safety of all residents.”
The full motion filed by Chelsea and Somerville this week can be read below:
Memorandum of Law – Chelsea and Somerville by Ross Cristantiello on Scribd
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