JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. – A Missouri Senator representing the southeast portion of the greater Kansas City region introduced a bill earlier this month hoping to cow cities or municipalities from acting as sanctuaries for undocumented immigrants.

State Senator Rick Brattin, R-District 31, filed SB 114 on Jan. 8, 2025, the first day of the legislative session.

The bill “creates new provisions relating to illegal aliens” by enacting four new provisions in the state constitution:

Fines any municipality that adopts or enacts sanctuary policies $25,500 each day those policies are in effect;

Requires all Missouri employers to enroll and participate in a federal work authorization program;

Makes it a Class D felony for any resident who encourages an undocumented immigrant to come to or live in Missouri, or knowingly conceals, harbors, or shields such a person;

Allows any law enforcement officer or agent to enforce federal immigration law.

According to the Center for Immigration Studies, an anti-immigration think tank that has been declared a hate group by the Southern Poverty Law Center, no municipality in Missouri has been identified as a sanctuary city. However, as the American Immigration Council points out, “there is no universal definition of a sanctuary policy.”

The AIC identifies several sanctuary policies that a city or state could adopt:

policies restricting the ability of state and local police to make arrests for federal immigration violations, or to detain individuals on civil immigration warrants;

policies prohibiting “287(g)” agreements through which ICE deputizes local law enforcement officers to enforce federal immigration law;

policies that prevent local governments from entering into a contract with the federal government to hold immigrants in detention;

policies preventing immigration detention centers;

policies restricting the police or other city workers from asking about immigration status;

policies restricting the sharing of certain information on immigrants with the federal government;

policies restricting local police responses to federal immigration detainers; and

policies refusing to allow ICE into local jails without a judicial warrant.

Last April, Missouri Republicans added a provision to the state budget aimed at blocking state funding from going to cities that declare themselves sanctuary cities by demanding those municipalities repay state money with interest. That provision was not enacted and is not part of the law.