Patricia Lim | KUT News
In a letter to Mayor John Whitmire on Monday, Texas Governor Greg Abbott’s office threatened to terminate $110 million in public safety grants to the city of Houston.
The threat came after Whitmire supported an ordinance intended to cut back on coordination between the Houston Police Department and U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).
“This is a crisis situation,” Whitmire said in a statement. “The potential loss of state funding poses real challenges for the Houston Police and Fire Departments and will impact public safety services across our city, the 2026 FIFA World Cup preparations and the Homeland Security Department.”
Spearheaded by council members Alejandra Salinas, Edward Pollard and Abbie Kamin, the new HPD policy prohibited officers from detaining people or lengthening traffic stops due to civil immigration warrants issued by ICE. The ordinance, which passed in a 12 to 5 vote on Wednesday, rolled back a policy requiring HPD officers to wait 30 minutes for ICE agents to respond.
“I repeatedly warned the ordinance sponsors, Council Members Salinas, Kamin, and Pollard about the legal and financial risks associated with this approach,” Whitmire wrote.
In the letter, Abbott’s office gave Whitmire an Apr. 20 deadline to “confirm that the City will not enforce, and will act to repeal, the ordinance.”
Last week, after Attorney General Ken Paxton said he would “absolutely stop” the implementation of the policy, Pollard called on Whitmire to fight back.
RELATED: Ken Paxton says he will ‘absolutely stop’ ordinance limiting coordination between HPD and ICE
“Hopefully the mayor’s voice carries on this,” said Pollard, whose office did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Monday. “Any pushback from the state level — he should ensure that his city attorney’s directive is protected and the vote of the council is protected.”
Likewise, during her campaign, Salinas called for the city to pick legal fights with the state government — especially with regard to immigration enforcement matters.
“Where the law is wrong, we need to fight back and bring litigation,” she told Houston Public Media before the runoff election in December.
On Monday, she characterized Abbott’s threat as “an attempt to bully our city for doing what is right.”
“We should not give in to this unlawful intimidation,” Salinas said. “Threatening to pull resources from police, firefighters and emergency responders puts politics over public safety and does nothing to make Houston safer.”
Dominic Anthony Walsh / Houston Public Media
Over the years, the city of Houston and the state government have repeatedly jousted. Under the late Mayor Sylvester Turner, the state’s General Land Office attempted to withhold funds for the recovery from Hurricane Harvey, which led to protracted litigation.
After five decades in the Republican-controlled Texas Legislature, Whitmire pitched himself as better suited to moderate tensions with the state government. During Whitmire’s first year as mayor, Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick called him a “no-nonsense guy,” adding “the state and city have the best relationship we’ve had in decades.”
That relationship collapsed after the vote on Wednesday.
“We have not seen during Mayor Whitmire’s tenure the same level of conflict between the state government and the city government,” said political scientist Mark Jones with Rice University. “It still remains to be seen how this outcome plays out, but there’s a reason why Mayor Whitmire, I think, initially opposed this legislation and only went along with it when it was clear that it was going to pass.”
In addition to Abbott’s threat to pull funding, Paxton — who is in a runoff election for the U.S. Senate — sent Whitmire a letter on Friday notifying him of an investigation into whether the city violated state law.
In his statement, Whitmire said city officials “have significant work ahead and I’m considering all options.”
The potential loss of public safety dollars comes as the city faces a record-setting budget deficit — projected to hit $174 million as the fiscal year ends in June.
RELATED: Houston again faces the largest budget deficit in city history. What’s Mayor Whitmire’s plan?
The measure in Houston is in line with San Antonio, in that officers are required to contact ICE about civil immigration warrants. By contrast, the police departments in Austin and Dallas give supervisors and officers discretion over whether or not to contact ICE. Like in Houston, officers in Dallas are not allowed to wait for the agency to respond.
When asked why only Houston is being targeted, a spokesperson for Abbott said in a statement, “Governor Abbott expects all local governments — cities or counties — to cooperate with ICE in enforcing federal immigration laws. Creative efforts by local governments to get around that obligation are unacceptable.”
In a brief phone call, Kamin — who is running to become Harris County Attorney — told Houston Public Media that Abbott is “defunding the police.”
The city of Houston, she continued, “has a responsibility to defend itself from state overreach and safeguard the constitutional rights afforded to all people who live in our great city.”
