Our Work

For decades, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) limited enforcement operations at so-called “sensitive locations” like courthouses, schools, or hospitals. But during both Trump Administrations, officials rescinded those guidelines. This report discusses states and localities’ ability to adopt their own state-law policies to protect “sensitive locations” from the disruption of warrantless immigration arrests.

"Politicians at all levels of government have called for reforms to deescalate tensions arising from federal immigration enforcement in their states. One common proposal is banning law enforcement officers — including Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and Customs and Border Protection officers — from wearing masks."

State and local governments are increasingly using property law to push back on ICE operations. This report unpacks the viability of these efforts, from banning new detention centers to barring officers from staging operations on city property.

From Portland to Minneapolis, aggressive actions by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents against citizens and noncitizens alike have been well documented. Many of these encounters raise grave constitutional concerns. Yet it may surprise—and alarm—many to learn that there is often no viable path to sue federal officers if they violate your constitutional rights, even egregiously.

The U.S. Justice Department has demanded states' complete, unredacted vote registration lists. States have mostly declined to provide their full, unredacted voter registration lists. This report examines the questions raised by the federal government's demands about the long-established authority of states to administer elections and the scope of the federal government’s role in the voter registration process.

Federal laws and institutions have long played a central role in addressing public corruption. This report considers the potential for states to play a more central role in addressing public corruption. To date, the vast majority of state public corruption prosecutions have involved misconduct by state or local officials. But beyond addressing public corruption at the state and local levels, state law also provides an underexplored pathway for deterring and punishing corrupt conduct at the federal level.

In a case concerning whether a federal statute, the Westfall Act, precludes all state-law damages actions against federal officials, even those based on federal constitutional violations, the State Democracy Research Initiative filed an amicus brief explaining that the U.S. Constitution’s structure envisions an active role for state laws and institutions in redressing the constitutional violations of federal actors, and, historically, state-level causes of action were the primary way for individuals to recover for injuries caused by such actors.

This Report describes the recently enacted mask ban in California and the proposed laws in other states. Under existing precedent, mask bans are neither clearly prohibited nor clearly permissible. This Report also provides an overview of other options states may have to address masking by federal law enforcement.

On September 18th, SDRI co-faculty directors Miriam Seifter and Rob Yablon participated in a panel discussing key laws governing federal vs. state powers, the changing scope of executive powers, and best practices for reporting on political issues like these at the state and local levels.

Victims of unconstitutional federal actions often have difficulty recovering money damages for their injuries. This Report discusses a potential remedial pathway that is beginning to garner interest among policymakers and litigants: state-created causes of action authorizing people to sue federal officials for damages.