Rather than prohibit local cooperation with ICE, Hochul targets state grants to curb it

“New York will not allow the use of State resources to assist in federal immigration raids on people who have not committed serious crimes.” 

The line from Gov. Kathy Hochul’s State of the State address on Tuesday earned her a standing ovation. But after the speech, no one quite knew exactly what Hochul had meant when she said it. She did not expand on the message on her address, nor did her accompanying policy book contain any details. In fact, the 160-page book didn't even mention the idea of restricting state funds’ use in cooperating with federal immigration agents.

Some observers made guesses about what policy the applause line would translate into. None turned out to be quite right. According to details provided to City & State, Hochul will propose restricting the use of future state-funded public safety grants given to local law enforcement. Under the new restrictions, local officials would not be allowed to use any tech paid for and personnel paid with state dollars to collaborate with federal immigration authorities. But for anything else that uses non-state dollars, local law enforcement has free range to collaborate with Immigration and Customs Enforcement all they like. Aside from these broad strokes, the Hochul administration is still ironing out the details and specific language of the proposal.

Ultimately, Hochul’s declaration doesn’t go as far as some may have interpreted. “It sounded like the framework of New York for all,” Assembly Member Jessica González-Rojas suggested on Tuesday, referring to the increasingly popular state bill Hochul has yet to publicly back that would codify existing sanctuary jurisdiction protections and expand them to apply locally statewide. 

But the sponsor of that bill told City & State he received no prior briefing from the governor’s office about potential support for the legislation, nor what Hochul meant about the use of state resources. State Sen. Andrew Gounardes wondered immediately after the speech whether it related to current state policy that dates back to a 2017 executive order that prohibits state agencies – including the State Police – from cooperating with federal immigration officials outside of criminal investigations. “It's unclear, based on her language that she said, whether they are codifying the executive order or if there is some other additional protection that she is proposing here,” Gounardes said. 

At least some immigration advocates took Hochul’s State of the State proposal to mean she planned to codify the order, one tenet of New York for All. But it doesn’t do that either. 

Technically, Hochul’s new proposal goes further than the existing executive order even if it does not codify it. Currently, a 2018 court decision prevents localities from honoring ICE detainer requests to hold someone beyond their scheduled release, but it does nothing to otherwise limit how local law enforcement can interact with ICE.

But Hochul’s plan to impose restrictions on state-funded grants still stops well short of the New York for All Act, which would both enshrine the existing executive order’s directive into state law and also outright ban local officials from working with ICE. It would explicitly prohibit what are known as 287(g) agreements that enable the federal government to deputize local law enforcement to carry out civil immigration action that a growing number of municipalities have signed since the start of 2025.