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“He is the only sheriff in Georgia who has taken advantage of a federal tool to expand his existing authority to help enforce immigration law,” said King after picking up a banner reading “Enforcement Works” for the rally. “A good question for sheriffs running for election is, ‘Why haven’t they?”
Warren has won praise from activists, fellow politicians, and voters for going beyond the call of duty to determine if one of his inmates broke his or her first law by slipping past the Border Patrol.
State law requires sheriffs to try to determine whether anyone jailed on felony or drunken driving charges is an illegal immigrant. Warren has had deputies trained through a federal program to better spot illegals and ordered them to investigate all inmates, even those charged with traffic offenses.
Warren contends he is only doing his job. “If you are calling my partnership with Immigration and Custom Enforcement an aggressive stance against illegal immigrants, I would have to strongly disagree,” he said in an email to The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. “If they are found to be in our country illegally, then it will be up to ICE as to whether they should be deported.”
There is little political downside to getting tough on illegal aliens in a GOP bastion. Most Georgians â especially Republicans â want illegals out of the country, said Chuck Clay, a former legislator and former head of the state GOP.
Many voters are fed up, charging illegals are a drain on schools, hospitals and jails.
“The demographics are changing,” he said. “Rightly or wrongly it cuts to the heart of who and what we are as a nation. What are we doing with our own country if we are going to sit by and let it change in its nature and makeup without a debate.”
Other sheriffs around the state say that are too short staffed to train deputies to serve as immigration-law enforcers â especially when federal officers survey metro Atlanta jails each week for illegal aliens to deport.
“We’re only looking at the ones who are DUI or felony charges because they are the undesirable ones,” said DeKalb County Chief Jailer Dennis Cheatham.
Gwinnett County Sheriff Butch Conway said he has two federal officers assigned to the jail to cull the illegals. The county jail has had more than 10,000 Hispanic inmates this year, with many picked up for driving without a license because illegal aliens they can’t get one, he said.
“People get tunnel vision and they want them loaded back on a bus and shipped back to Mexico, but that is not going to happen,” Conway said. “I think they’re going to move away but it will be because of the economy, not law enforcement.”
Terry Norris, head of the Georgia Sheriff’s Association, said sheriffs in more rural counties have a larger policing role than metro Atlanta sheriffs who largely leave law enforcement to county and city police forces. The rural sheriff may not want to seem overly aggressive against illegal immigration because it could mean losing the trust of the Latino community, Norris said.
“What sheriffs, including Neil, are trying to do is preserve the peace and make things safer,” Norris said. ” But a lot of sheriffs don’t have the resources to investigate whether everybody is here legally or not. We’re trying to solve crimes.”
Even some Cobb politicians worry that Warren may be giving the impression that Cobb is hostile to immigrants.
“I am concerned that it might be sending the wrong message out and I’ve made those concerns known to Sheriff Warren and he is going to try and make sure that message isn’t sent out,” said State Sen. Doug Stoner (D-Smyrna).
Jerry Gonzalez, executive director of the Georgia Association of Latino Elected Officials, says Warren is sending the wrong message.
“Anybody in law enforcement who deals with community policing shies away from these types of programs because they diminish trust within the immigrant community,” he said. “Either you’re going to be an immigration enforcer or your going to prevent or solve crime in your neighborhoods.”
Commission Chairman Sam Olens said the county welcomes legal immigrants but it has taken a tough stance against illegal aliens because it fears they bring crime and otherwise undermine neighborhoods.
“We’re going to use what legal means we have to protect our residents,” said Olens. “It is unfortunate that in other communities they ask police officers to look the other way.”
