Mayor Whitmire Signs an Executive Order Limiting When Houston Police Contact ICE: a Jailable Arrest, and a Warrant, Both Required

Houston Mayor John Whitmire signed an executive order on Friday changing the Houston Police Department's policy on contacting federal immigration authorities. Under the new policy, HPD will contact ICE only in a narrow case: a person arrested for a jailable offense who also has an administrative ICE warrant. The department will no longer contact ICE solely because someone has an administrative warrant if that person has not been arrested - and a person who is issued a citation, Whitmire said, will be allowed to go about their day.

Whitmire announced the order alongside Houston Police Chief J. Noe Diaz, who confirmed the department is updating its directive to officers. 'As the mayor stated, the message is clear. ICE will only be contacted if someone commits a jailable offense,' Diaz said. When an arrested person with a qualifying warrant is taken to jail, Whitmire said, officers will notify ICE - and from there, he said, it will be the responsibility of the Harris County Jail and Harris County government to respond accordingly.

The mayor framed the change as a public-safety measure intended to reduce fear and anxiety among Houston residents while keeping officers focused on crime. He said the decision followed conversations with newly elected state leaders, members of his administration, HPD leadership and community members. Whitmire also reached back to his own record: as a state senator, he voted against Senate Bill 4, the state immigration-enforcement law, because of the fear and anxiety he believed it would create - 'I voted no because we were concerned about the fear, the anxiety that it would create,' he said - while acknowledging the legislation's intent to remove dangerous criminals, and the city's dependence on state funding for services including public safety, transportation and the health department as a factor in how his administration previously handled the issue.

The timing is a choice, and Whitmire named it as one. He said he has been in contact with newly elected statewide officials and believes SB 4 will not be a priority for the incoming state leadership - but he is not waiting for January. 'It will improve our public safety. It will reduce the fear and anxiety of students, our workers, and I will take the responsibility of making this change, even with the current administration still in office for two months,' Whitmire said. The order answers, at least in part, the calls made this week from City Hall itself - the controller and a council member who pressed for reform after HPD's own quarterly report showed 88 immigration-related contacts from July through September.