Lebanon, Hanover and the entire state of Vermont were named recently to the list of more than 500 states, counties and cities designated as immigration “sanctuary jurisdictions” by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (perhaps more accurately described as the Department of Noemland Insecurity, Kristi L. Noem, proprietor).

No surprise there, given that all three jurisdictions have adopted policies that restrict police from participating in civil immigration enforcement. But also included on the list was the MAGA stronghold of Huntington Beach, Calif., which has filed suit against that state’s immigration sanctuary law and passed a resolution this year declaring the community as a “non-sanctuary city.” Among those dismayed was Mayor Pat Burns, a Trump supporter, who told the Associated Press, “You don’t have that many mistakes on such an important federal document.” Live and learn, Mayor Burns. At least you weren’t deported to El Salvador.

Shawano County, Wisc., also made the list, although 67% of residents there voted for Donald Trump last fall. County administrator Jim Davel thinks Noem might have gotten confused because the county voted in 2021 to become a “Second Amendment Sanctuary County” that prohibits gun control measures.

The list was rife with such errors and was withdrawn after Kieran Donahue, president of the National Sheriffs’ Association, accused the department of a lack of transparency and accountability in compiling it. “This list was created without any input, criteria of compliance, or mechanism for how to object to the designation,” Donahue complained.

No surprise there, either. Donald Trump’s Washington has become a sanctuary city for buffoons like Noem, whose disgraceful antics as secretary of the Department of Homeland Security are legion. Her conception of security runs to having her purse containing her DHS badge pilfered from under the table in a restaurant where she was dining.

As our colleague Emma-Roth Wells has reported, Hanover and Lebanon are also among the targets of two bills passed by the New Hampshire Legislature this year and signed into law by Gov. Kelly Ayotte. They purport to outlaw municipal policies barring police departments from cooperating with federal immigration agencies.

“Today, we’re delivering on our promise by banning sanctuary cities and supporting law enforcement cooperation with federal immigration authorities,” Ayotte said in endorsing the bills. “New Hampshire will never be a sanctuary for criminals.” Except, we guess, for those charged with serially abusing vulnerable children at the state’s youth detention facilities over many years and for whose conduct New Hampshire taxpayers are now on the hook for many millions of dollars.

Officials in Hanover and Lebanon are reviewing their respective policing policies and otherwise taking a wait-and-see attitude, as well they might while awaiting clarification from Washington and/or Concord that may never be forthcoming. Note that the Department of Homeland Security was directed by Trump to publish a list of those jurisdictions “deliberately obstructing the enforcement of federal immigration laws.” It certainly can be argued that non-cooperation by local police is not the same thing as obstructing federal agents from enforcing those laws. Immigration violations, after all, are a civil and not a criminal offense that would necessarily involve local police.

Hanover Town Manager Robert Houseman observes that the New Hampshire laws do not require local departments to enter into agreements with Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), something residents at Hanover Town Meeting overwhelmingly opposed. And as Roth-Wells reported, neither the Lebanon nor the Hanover police chief has any intention of charging into that minefield.

The parallel is not exact, but the similarity of today’s immigration dragnet with the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850 resonates. That law not only denied fugitives the right to challenge their detention in court, as the Trump administration has tried to do with immigrants, but also sought to compel local authorities to assist slave owners in recovering enslaved people who had managed to escape bondage, much as Homeland Security is now trying to coerce local jurisdictions into assisting with its dirty work. In the 1850s, resistance to this mandate by Congress was not by any means universal in the North, but history suggests that moral outrage was sufficiently strong to set the stage for the Civil War.

We think that Lebanon, Hanover and the state of Vermont should embrace their distinction as jurisdictions that restrict police from immigration enforcement, which the Constitution defines as a power to be exercised by the federal government. When the history of the Trump years comes to be written, they will have a place on the honor roll.