Mayors call off Trump meeting after DOJ threatens cities

A group of U.S mayors meeting in Washington, D.C., called off a scheduled White House meeting with President Donald Trump Wednesday after the administration again threatened to withhold funding from nearly two dozen local governments they claimed aren’t following immigration laws.

Members of the bipartisan U.S. Conference of Mayors, whose annual winter meeting in the nation’s capital kicked off Wednesday, had been slated to sit down with Trump later in the day to talk about the opioid epidemic and infrastructure. But the group’s leader canceled the official session, citing the White House’s “decision to threaten mayors and demonize immigrants yet again.”

““Many mayors of both parties were looking forward to visiting the White House today to speak about infrastructure and other issues of pressing importance to the 82 percent of Americans who call cities home,” Mitch Landrieu, the group’s president and the Democratic mayor of New Orleans, said in a statement. “Unfortunately, the Trump administration’s decision to threaten mayors and demonize immigrants yet again – and use cities as political props in the process – has made this meeting untenable.”

Image: Mitch Landrieu Image: Mitch Landrieu

New Orleans Mayor Mitch Landrieu speaks in Washington on race in America and his decision to take down Confederate monuments in his city on June 16, 2017. Jacquelyn Martin / AP file

“An attack on mayors who lead welcoming cities is an attack on everyone in our conference,” Landrieu added.

Earlier, New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio, who had been part of the group scheduled to go to the White House, tweeted that he wouldn’t attend the meeting because “@realDonaldTrump’s Department of Justice decided to renew their racist assault on our immigrant communities.”

“It doesn’t make us safer and it violates America’s core values,” de Blasio said.

Image: New York City mayor de Blasio speaks to guests during the National Action Network Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Day Public Policy Forum in the Harlem borough of New York City Image: New York City mayor de Blasio speaks to guests during the National Action Network Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Day Public Policy Forum in the Harlem borough of New York City

New York City mayor Bill de Blasio speaks to guests during the National Action Network (NAN) Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Day Public Policy Forum in New York City on Jan. 15, 2018. Eduardo Munoz / Reuters file

On Wednesday morning, Trump’s Justice Department told 23 local governments that they must prove they are abiding by an immigration law if they want to continue receiving money under a federal crime-fighting program — the latest step the agency has taken to combat so-called sanctuary cities.

The letters from the Justice Department demanded proof that the cities’ police and sheriff’s deputies are sharing information with federal immigration agents. If the communities refuse to respond, a Justice Department official said, the government would issue subpoenas ordering them to comply. The letters said they would not be awarded new grants, and that the government might come after them to return money they’ve received from previous grants if they are found to be out of compliance.

The mayors’ confab in Washington offered an immediate chance to respond to the administration’s action. Several cities have become both centers of resistance to Republican rule and proving grounds for progressives to show they can govern effectively. The conference had been touted as an opportunity for a rising cohort of mayors to discuss those progressive-learning solutions they’ve applied at home. Some may even be considering a run for president in 2020.

At a press conference after Landrieu announced the decision to call off the meeting, other prominent Democratic mayors, including Eric Garcetti of Los Angeles and Rahm Emanuel of Chicago, ripped Trump’s crackdown on immigrants and defended their cities as places of safety.

“The idea that the president of the United States and the Justice Department would arrest anyone of us for believing in our ideals and carrying out the laws of our city, is wrong. Fundamentally wrong,” Emanuel said.

He added that the meeting was going to focus on infrastructure, but that the White House prompted its dissolution because “the emperor has no clothes when it comes to infrastructure.”

Garcetti, meanwhile, said he had a “very clear” message for the nation’s capital.

“Washington, we are here to save you,” he said. “We are here to make sure the values of this country and the values of the progress of this nation are matched and are met.”