President Trump slammed a handful of Democratic mayors on Wednesday for bailing on an event due to his administration’s crackdown on so-called sanctuary cities, accusing them of prioritizing illegal immigrants over U.S. citizens.
“Sanctuary cities are the best friend of gangs and cartels like MS-13,” the president said during remarks at the White House to the U.S. Conference of Mayors, a group led by New Orleans Mayor Mitch Landrieu, who backed out of the event at the last minute.
Landrieu joined New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio and several others in boycotting their planned meeting with Trump after the Justice Department threatened to subpoena state and local officials in letters sent Wednesday to various sanctuary jurisdictions.
“The U.S. Conference of Mayors is proud to be a bipartisan organization,” Landrieu said in a statement. “But an attack on mayors who lead welcoming cities is an attack on everyone in our conference.”
Some metropolitan areas, like New York, Chicago, and San Francisco, have refused to cooperate with federal immigration enforcement efforts and forcefully criticized the Trump administration’s broader immigration agenda. Their critics argue that such sanctuary policies place the public at risk and promote crime in America’s cities.
“The Justice Department today has announced a critical legal step to hold accountable sanctuary cities that violate federal law and free criminal aliens back into our communities,” Trump said at the event.
The president was originally slated to discuss public-private infrastructure investments and the growing opioid crisis during his event with the mayors on Wednesday.
