Washington, D.C. – U.S. Conference of Mayors (USCM) CEO & Executive Director Tom Cochran
today issued the following statement regarding the U.S. Senate’s Immigration Cloture votes today:

“The nation’s mayors commend the United States Senate for today refusing to proceed to a vote on
two bills that would have further broken, not repaired, the nation’s immigration system.”

“S. 3100, the Stop Dangerous Sanctuary Cities Act, sponsored by Pennsylvania Senator Pat
Toomey, would have denied Community Development Block Grant and Economic Development
Administration funding to jurisdictions meeting the bill’s broad definition of a sanctuary city. Shifting
the federal responsibility of enforcing civil immigration law to local governments diverts critical
resources from their law enforcement agencies, compromises public safety, and hinders local police
department efforts to work with immigrant communities in preventing and solving crimes. S. 3100
could have affected as many as 300 jurisdictions across the nation, reducing their efforts to grow the
local economy and improve the quality of lives for low- and moderate-income citizens.”

“S. 2193, the Establishing Mandatory Minimums for Illegal Reentry Act, sponsored by Texas Senator
Ted Cruz, would have amended federal law to impose new mandatory minimum sentences for illegal
reentry offenses. This bill would have flown in the face of criminal justice reform efforts by increasing
the number of federal offenses – particularly those involving nonviolent crimes – with mandatory
minimum penalties and increasing, not decreasing, federal incarceration costs.”

“The U.S. Conference of Mayors urges the Senate instead to focus on fixing our broken immigration
system, as it did in bipartisan fashion in the last Congress, rather than passing punitive legislation that
penalizes cities trying to build trust with the communities they are charged with protecting and
assuring the safety of all of their residents.”