Why Should Delaware Care?
Delaware is one of only a handful of states without local police partnerships with ICE, even as the federal immigration enforcement has escalated nationwide. Local police may still be privately willing to partner with ICE and enforce immigration laws, despite publicly exiting the agreement a month ago.
Camden, Delaware’s Police Chief Marcus Whitney told Spotlight Delaware last month that he ended his department’s short-lived partnership with federal immigration agents because of pushback from his Kent County community.
But in an email to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials sent the same day, Whitney said he was only placing the partnership “on pause for the time being” — indicating that the department could re-enter the program that deputizes local officers to enforce federal immigration law.
Whitney further said in the email that he was pausing the agreement out of concern that it could encourage state lawmakers to pass a proposed bill to prohibit local and state police departments from working with ICE.
“I don’t want this to push our legislators to pass the bill,” Whitney said in the email.
Spotlight Delaware obtained the email from the ACLU of Delaware, which received it and others through an open records request.
Emails sent by federal officials to Whitney within the message thread are redacted entirely.
The revelation marks the latest development in a changing immigration landscape in Delaware since the start of President Donald Trump’s second term. It has been highlighted by a surge of arrests carried out by federal agents, as well as a push by state lawmakers to limit ICE’s ability to deputize local police.
ICE says its “task force model” partnership program, which Camden had been a part of, allows the federal agency to partner with state and local law enforcement in order to identify, arrest and deport undocumented immigrants with criminal records.
But critics say the program leads to racial profiling by local police and deteriorates trust between immigrant communities and law enforcement.
Lourdes Puig, spokesperson for the Delaware Hispanic Commission, said in a written statement that the commission remains “deeply concerned” about any potential renewal of the collaboration between ICE and Camden police.
“Partnerships like these create fear and mistrust among immigrant communities, regardless of legal status, and can undermine public safety by discouraging individuals from reporting crimes or cooperating with local law enforcement,” Puig said.
Whitney did not respond to requests for comment for this story.
Last month, he told Spotlight Delaware that the agreement had been done with “good intentions” and with the aim of focusing on people who already had faced a criminal complaint.
“It wasn’t done as a way to go around and round people up,” he said at the time.
The Delaware Association of Chiefs of Police met in March and reached a consensus that entering into ICE partnerships was not something that Delaware law enforcement should pursue, Richard McCabe, president of the organization and chief of the New Castle City Police Department, said in a written statement.
“However, we also recognized the importance of maintaining strong working relationships with our federal partners,” he said.
Emails shed light on partnership exit
On April 29, Camden police signed onto the 287(g) task force agreement with ICE — becoming the only law enforcement agency in the state to formally partner with federal immigration agents.
The town of about 4,000 residents sits in Kent County, south of Dover, and less than five miles from ICE’s Dover Field Office.
One day prior to signing the agreement, Whitney expressed interest in an email response to ICE officials with the subject line, “RE: 287(g) Training and Information.”
“I would be interested, please advise our next steps,” Whitney said in the email.
Days later, the public first became aware of Camden police’s partnership with ICE during a Camden Town Council meeting. During the May 5 meeting’s public comment period, a local activist asked the council whether it was true that their law enforcement was working with federal immigration officials.
A pause ensued. One council member can be heard saying, “no, not that I’m aware of,” followed by an interjection from Mayor Larry Dougherty Sr. who said “well.”
Dougherty Sr. then refused to disclose further details, saying the council would “talk about it later.”
“There is no discussion here,” Dougherty Sr. said during the meeting.
When questioned the next day, Whitney told Camden Councilmember Darlene Sturgeon in an email that he had “terminated” the town’s partnership with ICE — an apparent reference to his email exchange just minutes earlier with the federal agency stating he would place the deal “on pause for the time being.”
“The ‘cost/benefit’ analysis on this says we should withdraw from the program,” Whitney said in an email to Sturgeon.
In response to the email, Sturgeon reprimanded the police chief, writing that “anything that would tie us to another agency should be discussed and should not be brought up in public comment and completely catch the council, including myself, off guard.”
“It was not a good look,” Sturgeon said.
Sturgeon did not respond to a request for comment.
Delaware holds out as ICE partnerships jump nationwide
The task force partnership – which Camden had participated in – was formed under ICE’s 287(g) program, which allows the federal agency to delegate certain immigration duties to state and local law enforcement. The program allows local police, in general, to ask people about their immigration status, and transfer noncitizens into ICE custody, among other powers.
The number of 287(g) agreements has more than tripled since President Donald Trump took office in January. In May, the Trump administration pressured ICE officials to increase arrests to 3,000 per day.
The push led to a nationwide operation to increase arrests of undocumented immigrants by employing the help of over 5,000 personnel from numerous federal law enforcement agencies, including the FBI and IRS, according to reporting from NBC News.
In December 2024, ICE had 135 agreements with local or state law enforcement agencies across 21 states.
As of June, ICE has 641 agreements across 40 states, with an additional 82 pending agreements that have yet to be finalized.
Delaware is one of ten states that don’t have any active or pending agreements with ICE.
The program became law in 1996 as part of the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act.
About two weeks after Camden police withdrew from the program, Rep. Mara Gorman introduced a bill that would bar law enforcement agencies from entering into agreements with federal immigration authorities.
House Bill 182 would prohibit any law enforcement in Delaware from enforcing immigration violations or sharing immigration enforcement-related data with ICE.
McCabe, from the Delaware Association of Chiefs of Police, said his organization cannot support any legislation that would prohibit local law enforcement from cooperating with federal partners.
Still, he also said that “it is outside the scope of our role to act as federal immigration officers.”