Federal Officials Made Requests To Hold Immigrants In Baltimore

BALTIMORE (WJZ) —Federal immigration agents have asked the state-run Baltimore Central Booking and Intake Center to hold dozens of immigrants in custody. That's according to our media partners at The Baltimore Sun. 

Local officials say they have received no such requests.

Since 2015,U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement has asked the state officials who run the facility in Baltimore to hold at least 40 inmates for 48 hours beyond the time when they would normally have been released. This is to give federal agents the opportunity to pick them up for alleged immigration violations.

Federal officials have told the states in many cases the immigrants had prior criminal convictions or alleged gang ties, which made them a priority for deportation.

A state spokesman says corrections officials work with the Department of Homeland Security to help agents apprehend undocumented immigrants at their release and don't hold them behind bars for extra time.

Governor Larry Hogan's administration has offered different explanations for how it is approaching the detainer requests. It comes as Baltimore and other jurisdictions have faced threats from the Trump Administration to abandon sanctuary policies or risk losing federal funding.

State officials have recently said they haven't received any requests from ICE to hold undocumented immigrants. They said if they did, they would consider them on a "case-by-state basis." Governor Hogan's administration has not said what factors would go into these decisions.

Follow @CBSBaltimore on Twitter and like WJZ-TV | CBS Baltimore on Facebook