Several Republican members of Congress called for criminal investigations — or even the arrest — of Mayor Mike Johnston and other city officials at an hours-long hearing before the powerful House Oversight committee in Washington on Wednesday.
“We’ve had enough. America's fed up with this betrayal of oaths, and one of you said you're willing to go to jail. We might give you that opportunity,” said Rep. Clay Higgins of Louisiana — a comment pointedly directed at Johnston, who previously said he would stand up for the city’s immigration policies even if it meant arrest.
Rep. Gary Palmer of Alabama accused Johnston and the mayors of several other cities of “obstruction of justice.” Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia even suggested there had been “treason.” Meanwhile, the committee’s chairman, Rep. James Comer of Kentucky, said not a “single penny in federal funding" should go to the four cities whose mayors testified, also including New York City, Boston and Chicago.
The hearing was part of a larger inquiry by national Republicans into “sanctuary” cities that limit how police and other employees cooperate with immigration authorities. Johnston and the other mayors defended those policies, saying their cities still comply with all state and federal laws.
Rep. Anna Paulina Luna of Florida put the most specific point on the Republicans’ allegations, accusing Johnston of committing a federal crime by housing new arrivals, arguing it meets the legal standard of harboring undocumented immigrants, a felony under the 1952 Immigration and Nationality Act.
“I do not think you guys are bad people, but I think that you are ideologically misled, which is why unfortunately, based on your responses, I'm going to be criminally referring you to the Department of Justice for investigation. And as soon as I leave here, these will be going over to [Attorney General] Pam Bondi. I'm not doing that in an effort to bully you guys, but I do believe that your policies are hurting the American people,” Luna said.
The mayors did get support from the dozens of Democratic representatives on the panel, with the legal threats dismissed as “total [BS]” by Democratic Rep. Melanie Stansbury of New Mexico.
The Oversight committee is the investigative body of the House, with the subpoena power to obtain evidence and compel testimony. It does not have the power to strip funding or press criminal charges, but by holding this hearing, it joins a larger Trump administration push against Denver and the other cities.
Still, afterward, Johnston said he was surprised by lawmakers’ talk of criminal referrals for the mayors.
“We do not harbor anyone,” he said. “We were providing services. I think there’s no federal law that makes it illegal to give someone food who is hungry, or put someone into an overnight shelter who is at risk of freezing. I think that’s just common decency and humanity."
Is Denver a ‘sanctuary’ or not?
Of the mayors on Wednesday’s panel, only New York City’s Eric Adams directly accepted the “sanctuary” label, which originated from the progressive Sanctuary Movement in the 1970s and ‘80s. Johnston rejected it for Denver.
“No, sir. I disagree with you,” Johnston said in a heated exchange with Rep. Jim Jordan of Ohio. “If you talk about sanctuary as a definition of shielding people from law enforcement, we do not do that.”
Johnston argued that sanctuaries actively “shield” immigrants and people with criminal records from deportation. He said Denver simply focuses its resources on local affairs and leaves immigration to the feds.
“I don’t think anyone in that room could define what ‘sanctuary city’ is,” Johnston said afterward. “We don’t offer sanctuary, but we do offer services.”
The city of Denver and the state of Colorado have passed numerous laws that limit cooperation with law enforcement or provide benefits for undocumented immigrants. Those laws are the result of decades of advocacy.
Local officials have defended many of these policies as good for public safety, arguing it harms the wider community when immigrants are afraid to report crime because of the threat of deportation, or drive without insurance because they can’t get a driver’s license.
Johnston sticks to unity message
Rep. Nancy Mace of South Carolina pushed the mayors with loaded “yes or no” questions.
“Do you all hate Donald Trump more than you love your country?" she asked.
“I love my country,” Johnston said twice as Mace verbally poked and prodded.
“Do you love illegal aliens more than you love your fellow countrymen?” Mace asked.
Johnston responded: "I love all the residents of the city and county…" before she cut him off.
That summed up Johnston’s love-and-unity approach to this day in the national spotlight.
While other mayors occasionally criticized Republicans or blamed Congress for its numerous failures to pass immigration reform, Johnston focused on framing Denver as a reasonable city trying to navigate a crisis humanely and practically.
In his opening, Johnston said, “as a man of faith, I have a moral obligation to care for those in need … So that’s what we did. In Denver, we believe our problems are solvable, and we are the ones to solve them. So, we went to work.”
Going toe-to-toe with Jim Jordan
One of Johnston’s longer segments came early in the hearing, when Rep. Jordan interrogated him about the case of a Venezuelan immigrant named Abraham Gonzalez, who was released from a Denver jail last Friday.
Jordan said immigration agents asked for a two-day notice before Gonzalez’ release, but only got an hour’s warning, despite the man’s alleged gang membership and record of charges for auto theft, menacing and aggravated assault. Jordan said a federal agent was assaulted as a team tried to arrest Gonzalez outside the jail. He blamed the incident on the fact that the pickup didn’t happen in the building.
Johnston was apparently prepared for the question, speaking familiarly about the case and pushing back on Jordan’s assertions.
“There were six ICE agents present when he was released, so they had enough time to respond and to be present,” he said.
Johnston said it was the first problematic incident in some 1,200 similar releases, and that he is meeting with ICE soon to discuss what happened.
But Jordan kept coming back to the question of why the city wouldn’t simply make the handover in the jail.
“That is how stupid sanctuary polices are,” Jordan said.
Johnston said he was willing to make adjustments.
“I've seen the video. I've reached out [to ICE] and … if we need to make adjustments to what we do on releases, we'll do that,” he said.
It was a line of questioning that, hours later, Rep. Jeff Crank of Colorado Springs also pursued. Crank spent most of his five minutes berating Johnston over that transfer.
“Let's just be honest, with no Denver Police Department officer there to assist if the situation turns violent, that's irresponsible. And be clear, there's no federal law that forces you to do it this way,” he said.
Questioned by Coloradans
Republican Rep. Lauren Boebert of Windsor sits on the committee and was expected to go hard on Johnston, but her questioning of the mayor turned out to be relatively mild compared to some other Republicans.
She honed in on specific issues, like how Denver handles detainer requests — which are requests to keep immigrants in jail past their normal release time so they can be picked up by immigration agents.
Under Colorado law, jails cannot honor detainer requests without a federal warrant.
"There are issues before warrants are issued," Boebert insisted.
This question of when immigration authorities should get involved in a case — after someone is arrested for any crime, or not until a judge has weighed in — is a central divide in the debate over immigration enforcement.
While they’re not regular members of the Oversight committee, the three other Republicans in Colorado’s delegation also joined the hearing and questioned Johnston.
Rep. Gabe Evans, a former police officer, had a back-and-forth with Johnston about crime statistics, claiming crime rose sharply in the city along with the number of new arrivals. “I think you may have some bad facts,” Johnston told Evans at one point.
Evans also pressed Johnston on the idea that local authorities don’t have statistics on crime by immigrants, since they’re barred from collecting that information.
“Do you know how many of those 65 to 71 homicides were committed by people illegally present in the country?” Evans said, referring to the city’s recent annual murder counts. Neither he nor Johnston seemed to have that information.
Overall, immigrants commit crimes at lower or equal rates to native-born citizens, several studies have found. Other research has found no connection between the number of undocumented residents in a community and its crime rates. To make those arguments, Democrats invited an expert from the libertarian Cato Institute to be their witness on the panel.
The city’s murder and overall crime rates have fallen in recent years, even with the arrival of tens of thousands of new immigrants, but they remain above pre-pandemic levels.
The inquiry could continue for months
A number of Democrats brought up a bill — the No Bailout for Sanctuary Cities Act — that, if passed, would withhold federal funds from sanctuary cities and states.
Rep. Summer Lee, a Pennsylvania Democrat, summed up the hearing as, “nothing more than a shakedown of some of our nation's biggest cities.”
As she put it: “If they work for ICE, they risk violating their own residents constitutional rights and opening themselves up to costly litigation, but if they don't do Trump's bidding, they're being threatened with losing federal funding … in Trump's America, if you disagree with his priorities, then you lose federal dollars.”
While the Wednesday hearing stretched to six hours, it may just have been the beginning. The city is prepared to spend up to $2 million on a high-powered D.C. law firm to respond to an inquiry they expect could last months.
Despite the harsh questioning and weeks of hype, Comer said it was a relatively tame day, by the Oversight committee’s standards.
“This is the best behaved this committee has been,” Comer said to laughs as he gavelled out.
After the hearing, Johnston said it wasn’t all bad.
“I understand some people are more interested in theater than in substance, but a handful of members asked their questions, wanted to give you time to respond,” he said. “And so I felt like we got to at least make the case for those who are willing to listen."
