Unless you’ve been on a complete screentime fast or live far away in an isolated mountain compound — on both fronts, a state deserving of envy — you’ve likely become very familiar with the phrase “Sanctuary City” over the past year or so.
It’s a designation that brought the ire of the Trump administration onto cities like Rochester, Chicago and Los Angeles, spurring federal lawsuits, protests and updated legislation meant to solidify a city’s stance on immigration enforcement. It is also a self-proclamation that has few rivals for being so poorly understood, credit for which has to be given to willful misrepresentation in political rhetoric.
Rochester is currently embroiled in a federal lawsuit brought by the Trump administration over its sanctuary policy, and, in August, updated its policy to include protections for LGBTQIA+ and gender nonconforming individuals as well as clear outlines for disciplining employees who violate the policy.
So, what is a Sanctuary City? Why are they so despised by the federal administration? What does the designation do? Here’s the rundown.
A city for all
A Sanctuary City is a very simple idea: it’s written policy believing that all people — regardless of immigration status — can work and live without fear of persecution by immigration enforcement.
That does not mean that Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) or any other federal immigration enforcement can’t operate in Rochester. It simply means the city’s police and government workers aren’t supposed to help. They are forbidden from asking questions about immigration status, arresting people for being in the country illegally or working with immigration enforcement solely to arrest undocumented immigrants.
The premise is under the Tenth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution, which states that “The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.”
Immigration enforcement is a solely federal power. Therefore, Sanctuary Cities operate under the legal grounding that they have the ability to choose whether or not to aid in enforcement.
The city’s top lawyer, Patrick Beath, argued that the federal government suing the city over it declining to help immigration enforcement is tantamount to the administration commandeering local police. The lawsuit against the city stemmed from a traffic stop in March 2025, during which Rochester police aided immigration agents in arresting three men from Guatemala. Afterward, all 10 officers were briefly taken off the street for additional training.
“Federal law enforcement agents at the scene unlawfully conscripted local police to engage in federal civil immigration enforcement in violation of the Tenth Amendment to the Constitution,” Beath wrote in his response to the complaint. “This suit represents the federal government’s formal ratification of the commandeering of local police to enforce federal immigration regulations and policy.”
But that doesn’t mean police can’t respond to immigration scenes. They can — and they can help federal agents, if it’s in the interest of public safety. That role is largely relegated to securing scenes and safety.
So why is Trump suing?
Under the second term of Donald Trump, immigration enforcement has ramped up radically.
In June alone, 1,374 detainments were made in New York by ICE, according to data provided by the agency. That’s about the same as June, July, August, September and October of 2024 combined.
Against that backdrop, Sanctuary Cities provide a challenge to that sort of ramp-up. Without a free, willful exchange of assistance between law enforcement, the federal government is on its own.
Now, the federal government argues something called the ‘Supremacy Clause of the Constitution,’ which means federal law is the supreme law of the land, superseding state and local law.
Essentially, the federal government argues that by Sanctuary Cities not actively aiding federal immigration enforcement, they are obstructing federal law.
“The law and policies intentionally obstruct the sharing of information envisioned by Congress, thereby impairing federal detention of removable aliens, including dangerous criminals, as required by federal law,” the complaint reads.
What can Rochester do?
When faced with a challenge like the federal government suing over its policies, a city has two choices: cede to pressure or double down. Rochester doubled down.
In August, the Rochester City Council unanimously approved a new Sanctuary bill; its first revision since 2017 and second since the city first adopted the status in 1986.
The new bill does a multitude of things, including barring discrimination based on gender identity, blocking city contractors from discriminating based on immigration status and requiring all buildings with single-person bathrooms to label them gender neutral. Most notably, it gives clear outlines for discipline if a city employee violates a rule, up to termination.
Councilmember Stanley Martin was among the authors of the bill.
“The biggest thing I feel is, I want people to know that we as a city, care about immigrants. We care about the (LGBTGIA+) community, the communities that have historically been under attack,” she said, in an interview following the August vote. “I’m going to sleep hoping that people feel more supported today than they did before this was passed.”
