An effort by progressive California to unmask ICE agents in an effort to help their street fighters locate and terrorize (or worse) ICE agents has been struck down by the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals.
From summary of the ruling, “In sum, if a state law directly regulates the governmental conduct of the United States without congressional authorization, it is void irrespective of whether the regulated activities are essential to federal functions or operations, and irrespective of the degree to which the state law interferes with such functions or operations.”
9th Circuit Court Smacks Down CA Law Unmasking ICE Agents– thefederalist.com
News Source
EXCERPT:
A federal appellate court shot down a California law on Wednesday that sought to require ICE agents to show identification while conducting immigration operations in the state.
In its unanimous ruling, a three-judge panel for the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals held that Section 10 of the state’s No Vigilantes Act violates the U.S. Constitution’s Supremacy Clause, which specifies that federal law supersedes state law. The panel was comprised of Judge Jacqueline Nguyen, an Obama appointee, and Judges Mark Bennett and Daniel Collins, both Trump appointees.
According to The Hill, the Justice Department sued the Golden State last year after Democrat Gov. Gavin Newsom signed the No Vigilantes Act, “which demands that plainclothes law enforcement officers operating in California ‘shall visibly display identification.’” In conjunction with California’s No Secret Police Act — “which banned federal law enforcement officers from wearing masks while carrying out operations in the state” — “the law took effect on Jan. 1 and required officers to show identification while performing their duties.”
The 9th Circuit previously granted the Trump administration’s emergency request to block the contested statute while the court considered the merits of the issue.
In affirming that blockade, Bennett and his colleagues concluded that the Trump administration is “certain to succeed” on the merits of its supremacy clause argument because Section 10 of the No Vigilantes Act “attempts to directly regulate the United States in its performance of governmental functions, and Congress has not authorized such regulation.” The Supremacy Clause, the Trump appointee noted, explicitly bars states “from directly regulating federal operations even when regulating state operations in the same manner.”
