Grundy County clarifies non-sanctuary county status

Grundy County Sheriff Ken Briley and Grundy County State’s Attorney Russ Baker clarified Tuesday what Grundy County’s status as a non-sanctuary county, as approved in December 2023, means for how law enforcement takes action.

Board Chairman Drew Muffler said residents voted that Grundy County authorities should aid the federal government regarding immigration enforcement by a vote of 17,207 “yes” to 9,672 “no,” but this resolution was non-binding.

“What we did was is we said, we’re getting different guidance from the federal government and from the state government,” Muffler said. “How do Grundy County residents feel about how Grundy County should handle certain issues? What we did was we had three non-binding resolutions.”

Briley explained where the county stands, using ILCS 805-1, the TRUST Act:

“A law enforcement agency or law enforcement official shall not detain or continue to detain any individual solely on the basis of any immigration detainer or civil immigration warrant. A law enforcement agency or law enforcement official shall not stop, arrest, search, detain or continue to detain a person solely based on an individual’s citizenship or immigration status, unless presented with a federal criminal warrant. A law enforcement agency or official may not participate, support or assist in any capacity with an immigration agent’s enforcement operations, including any collateral assistance, such as coordinating an arrest in a courthouse or other public facility, providing use of any equipment, transporting any individuals, or establishing a security or traffic perimeter surrounding such operations or any other on-site support, give any immigration status, including by telephone, to any individual who is in that agency’s custody, transfer any person into an immigration agent’s custody, provide information in response to immigration agent’s inquiry or request for information regarding any individual in the agency’s custody.”

Briley said the state is pretty clear, and there has not been any Immigration and Customs Enforcement activity in Grundy County as far as he knows.

“What’s happening is, since the President (Donald Trump) took over, is ICE agents have a targeted list of individuals that are in the country illegally and have committed crimes in Illinois or in other states, for that matter. That list is targeted, and those are the people they’re going after,” he said.

Briley said he’s had calls in his office from business owners worried about their employees, like one woman who is in the United States illegally who had her purse stolen. She was afraid to call the police to report it.

He had another call from a mother concerned about taking her 16-year-old daughter out to get her driving hours, since she’s in the country illegally, Briley said.

“That’s not the intention of ICE,” he said. “ICE is not here to take mothers away from their kids, people who have been in this country for 20 years that aren’t committing crimes. They’re targeting individuals here who are committing crimes. It’s complicated.”

Briley said these are civil immigration laws, not criminal, and that’s not the Sheriff’s Office’s responsibility.

“Just like the IRS agents handle the IRS’ laws, we don’t handle immigration law,” Briley said. “We’re not even allowed to assist ICE, and ICE understands that.”

Baker said people need to remember the difference between federal, civil and state local criminal cases.

Grundy County enforces state local criminal cases, and it’s not illegal in Illinois to be an illegal immigrant. There’s no state law, Baker said, that says immigrants can be arrested for that.