(Editor's note: This is just one part of a series of stories about local candidates in the upcoming June 2 primary, municipal and school board election. Find more coverage here.)
Simplified: Sioux Falls Simplified readers submitted several questions about public safety and the Sioux Falls Police Department ahead of the June 2 election. One of the topics that came up was questions about how the city's new leadership would approach collaboration between federal immigration officers and local police.
Here's what we asked all of the City Council candidates:
Do you support collaboration between the Sioux Falls Police Department and federal immigration officials, i.e. ICE?
Here's what candidates had to say (in alphabetical order):
Zach DeBoer
"That’s a tricky one especially with the current environment," DeBoer said. "I think there are ways to collaborate or at least coexist in a peaceful way, and I think it really depends on what that project or effort is before i give a blanket stamp of approval.
"Certainly with a lot of things going on in regards to ICE and other sort of events like that, I think, you do have to take pause and assess what’s being done and how it’s being done, and looking at issues other people have faced."
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Tommy Kunz
"I do not," Kunz said, noting that the exception would be in instances where someone who's undocumented committed a violent crime.
"But, you know, what we're seeing right now (in Minneapolis) ... partnering with (ICE) to go like door to door to do knocks, and it's like, that's unreasonable search and seizure, and there's the whole constitutional violations to that," Kunz said. "And I think we want to see local police more uphold the Constitution, since that's like our first line of defense.
"You know, if the local police aren't, if they're out helping stepping on your rights, who's gonna stop it?"
Matthew McKinley
McKinley did not respond to multiple calls and emails requesting an interview.
Zak Okuwe
Okuwe said it's a question he struggles with, especially as an immigrant himself.
"We do live in a very conservative state, and if you criticize that in any way, right, I mean, you would be attacked from so many different directions," Okuwe said. "I mean, I guess that question caught me off guard. I mean, I know it's just, it's sad, the state we're in right now as a country. I wish there was a better answer to this, but this is coming all the way from a federal level, and our hands our kind of tied. I mean, it's certainly something that I'll speak up against."
Bob Trzynka
"That is a difficult question," Trzynka said. "There is a separation of powers issue. There's a federalism issue. As an attorney, I've dealt with a lot of these constitutional issues before, and I while I appreciate that we should have cooperation across law enforcement initiatives, I do believe that there's a federalism issue in place.
"Let local law enforcement deal with local law enforcement issues. We shouldn't be federalizing local law enforcement to do a job that is a federal job."
See all Simplified election coverage here:
