On Thursday, Attorney General Pam Bondi signed a two-page order designating an emergency police commissioner for the city’s Metropolitan Police Department and terminating immigration protections in Washington, D.C.
The primary focus of Bondi’s order, “Restoring Safety and Security to the District of Columbia,” was sanctuary city regulations. Any regulation that restricted Metropolitan Police officers’ ability to handle undocumented immigrants was repealed.
She also appointed Terry Cole, the administrator of the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA), as the department’s new emergency police commissioner, which diminished the authority of MetroPolice Chief Pamela Smith. All of the position’s authority was granted to him.
Cole has the authority to issue written departmental regulations, executive instructions, and general orders in his capacity as commissioner. His consent is now required before current police leaders may issue their own orders.
Additionally, Bondi revoked three immigration-related orders issued by Metro Police during the previous two years. Smith’s executive order from earlier Thursday, which restricted collaboration with federal immigration police, was the most recent.
Smith’s ruling permitted cops to transport federal immigration officials and exchange information about individuals who are not in custody. However, it prevented authorities from looking up someone’s immigration status in databases. Additionally, it said that unless there was another criminal offense, police could not make an arrest based only on federal immigration warrants.
Just a few hours later, Bondi revoked the order. Additionally, she revoked an October 2023 regulation that prohibited arrests based solely on federal immigration warrants and a June 2024 rule that restricted inquiries regarding immigration status.
According to her decision, any existing MPD instructions are hereby revoked to the extent that any of the provisions in this order conflict with them.
The action follows President Donald Trump’s Monday executive order establishing a federal takeover of the police department and a crime emergency in the nation’s capital.
The National Guard and federal law enforcement have since been stationed around the city. As part of the raid, authorities arrested 45 people on Wednesday night alone, including 29 illegal immigrants.
Residents of the District of Columbia, the millions of visitors from across the globe who come to our nation’s capital each day, and the thousands of Americans who commute there for work each day all have a right to feel safe and free from the plague of violent crime, according to Bondi’s ruling.
