The New Orleans Police Department’s decision to repeal a policy limiting officers’ coordination with federal immigration agents spurred fury from immigration attorneys and advocates Thursday — and a defense from Mayor Helena Moreno, who blamed the change on a Louisiana law banning “sanctuary” policies in the state.
For a decade, the NOPD adhered to the policy devised under a federal consent decree that both barred officers from asking people about their immigration status and prevented them from complying with immigration detainers — requests for local police to hold people with outstanding warrants until they can be taken into federal custody.
But NOPD repealed and replaced the policy Sunday with language directing officers to remand people with detainers to federal custody if the local jail won’t accept them. Officers are still directed not to ask people about their immigration status. But the new policy also appears to broaden the type of information NOPD officers can share with immigration agents, such as birth dates and whether an arrestee has a foreign passport, according to attorneys who reviewed the new rules for the Times-Picayune.
Moreno defended the police department’s decision in an interview Thursday after The Times-Picayune published a news story detailing the changes. Her office had previously declined to explain the new policy, while NOPD officials confirmed which changes had taken effect but declined to explain how they would work in practice.
The department, Moreno argued, had no choice but to change the policy due to the ban on “sanctuary cities” the Louisiana Legislature passed in 2024. Attorney General Liz Murrill, a Republican, invoked the law late last year when she wrote to city officials threatening legal action if they did not revise the NOPD policy.
The law contains language ordering law enforcement agencies to “comply with the requests made in immigration detainers.”
“When the state law was passed, whether there’s a policy or not, law enforcement agencies across the state are required to follow it, ” Moreno said. “I see obviously there are some people who are upset with NOPD and their policy. But it’s not really NOPD they should be upset with — it’s the law.”
Her response highlights the tenuous position Moreno and other local leaders are navigating between President Donald Trump’s ongoing immigration crackdown, which is supported by Louisiana’s solidly-conservative state government, and New Orleans’ Democratic voting base.
Advocates blast lack of clarity
Moreno, a Democrat, won her mayoral election last fall in a landslide, including with support from immigrant-rights advocates.
Some of those advocates this week said the mayor’s office and NOPD had not made an effort to engage with them or explain changes to the public before they took effect.
A lack of information from officials about the policy has led to fear and confusion among immigrants, said Tania Wolf, southeast advocacy manager for the National Immigration Project.
“What we want is clarity and correction of the misinformation that’s confusing the community, and figuring out whether the leaders of this city are aligned with the community or not,” she said.
NOPD officials have declined to answer questions about how the new policy will be implemented, including requests to identify scenarios in which officers will refer people they encounter to federal authorities. Moreno on Thursday said she was unsure whether the department had begun training officers on the policy, directing the question to NOPD.
In a statement this week, police spokesperson Reese Harper denied that the department had implemented a policy “granting federal immigration agents additional authority.”
“NOPD does not conduct civil immigration enforcement, does not make immigration determinations, does not issue or act on detainers, and does not control federal enforcement actions or jail operations,” Harper said. “Any implication otherwise is inaccurate.”
Harper did not respond to additional questions. The NOPD did not immediately respond Thursday to a request to interview Superintendent Anne Kirkpatrick about the policy.
Amid the criticism, Moreno signed an executive order Thursday saying that the city will not enter 287(g) agreements, or deals with the federal government under which local police are deputized for immigration enforcement.
The executive order “confirms the position of the Moreno Administration regarding the proper use of the limited resources of the New Orleans Police Department, which has made remarkable gains in reducing violent crime despite persistent understaffing and stark fiscal constraints,” a statement accompanying the order reads.
‘Clear as mud’
Since the police department changed the policy on Sunday, immigration attorneys have been combing through it, trying to understand its ramifications.
Mary Yanik, a Tulane University law professor and director of the school’s Immigrant Rights Clinic, called the new policy “clear as mud,” saying language raised questions.
“Hundreds of officers are immediately responsible for implementing it and probably have the same questions we all do,” she said.
One such question stems from a portion of the new policy which directs officers to remand people with detainers to the Orleans Parish Sheriff’s Office, which runs the city’s local jail. If the sheriff’s office won’t accept someone, officers are instructed to give them to the feds.
That language appears to direct officers to hand people with civil immigration detainers directly to immigration agents, according to immigration attorneys and two former U.S. Department of Homeland Security officials who reviewed the policy. Those people, they said, wouldn’t be eligible to be held in a local jail for people accused of felonies.
An OPSO spokesperson did not respond this week to questions about the new NOPD policy.
If someone in the FBI-run National Crime Information Center has an outstanding immigration warrant, officers must now treat the encounter “as a 17-F,” or fugitive scenario, the policy now reads.
“My office worked collaboratively with the leadership of NOPD to ensure that its immigration policy complies with state and federal law,” Murrill said Thursday. “We agreed on common-sense changes, and I believe its revised policy is now compliant.”
Moreno in Thursday’s interview likened the 2024 state law that led to the new policy to other conservative-led state initiatives that New Orleans leaders have been forced to comply with, including an expanded concealed carry law.
Asked if ongoing negotiations between city and federal officials over federal grant money contributed to the rule change, Moreno said no. In her understanding, she said, the feds’ decision to label New Orleans a “sanctuary city” — a designation the feds have used to withhold funds from some cities — stemmed from a separate non-cooperation policy in use at the Sheriff’s Office. A lawsuit Murrill’s office has filed over that policy is awaiting a ruling.
Moreno insisted that NOPD would not prioritize immigration-related work despite the new policy.
“NOPD is required to follow laws,” she said. “Their priority is always going to be that they keep people in the city of New Orleans safe, that it’s really violent crime they’re focused in on.”
The removal last year of the NOPD’s federal consent decree left the city with little legal recourse but to comply with the state law from 2024, Moreno said.
“The questions about operation and all that needs to go back to the author of that legislation as to what there intent was,” she said.
That legislation’s sponsor was State Sen. Blake Miguez, R-Erath, who filed it while he was in the state House. Miguez, who is now running for the U.S. House, did not immediately respond to a message about how the NOPD policy should be implemented.
date: 2026-02-12 22:34:00
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