Photo by yonas1

Secure Communities, a new and controversial federal immigration enforcement program, goes into effect in D.C. tomorrow, and local officials aren’t happy about it. In a statement issued today, Mayor Vince Gray expressed his concern with the program, under which local criminal records submitted to the FBI are checked against federal immigration databases.

“I’m disappointed that the federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency has decided to proceed with this program despite the vocal objections of local law-enforcement and elected officials in the District,” he said said. “In areas like the District that have large immigrant communities, police rely on the trust of those community members that their immigration status will not be threatened by their cooperation in local law-enforcement investigations. Secure Communities jeopardizes that trust, and consequently makes everybody less safe.”

In the lead-up to Secure Communities’ implementation, there was broad disagreement as to whether cities and states could opt out or not. In 2010, the D.C. Council passed legislation ordering that the city not participate; Arlington County did the same. Federal officials have said that there’s no real way to opt out, since the program merely connects FBI criminal databases—which are often used by local police departments—with federal immigration databases. (The only safe opt-out is if local police never checked criminal records against FBI databases.)

As a means to express his disagreement with the program, last October Gray ordered D.C. police not to ask questions about immigration status during routine stops or for minor crimes. (The move prompted some to call D.C. a “sanctuary city.”) And early last month the D.C. Council moved on legislation that would allow the city to hold suspected undocumented immigrants for the feds only if they’re wanted for violent crimes in the last decade and then only for 24 hours and with reimbursement expected.