Local Voices: Ellis/Andrews Campaign says 287(g) Signing Welcome, but Too Little, Too Late

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Governor Wes Moore today signed legislation banning 287(g) agreements between local law enforcement and ICE. The Ellis/Andrews campaign, seeking the Green Party nomination for Governor and Lt. Governor, has called for ending these agreements since Ellis launched the campaign last year. In January they became the first gubernatorial campaign in Maryland to call for the complete abolition of ICE. The campaign said the signing is welcome but insufficient, and that the sheriffs’ defiance proves why one bill is not enough.

Nine Maryland counties had active or pending 287(g) agreements allowing local sheriffs to act as federal immigration agents. Even before the signing, sheriffs in those counties vowed to continue cooperating with ICE regardless of the new law. Carroll County Sheriff Jim DeWees said, “No politician or legislative body is going to tell me that I can’t communicate with another law enforcement agency on matters of public safety in my community.”

“Governor Moore did the right thing by signing this bill. But last year after the House passed a 287(g) ban, Governor Moore and Senate President Bill Ferguson worked to stop it. For an entire year, families lived under agreements the legislature could have ended. Those agreements were just one piece of a much larger problem, ICE arrested over 3,300 people in Maryland in 2025 — more than two-thirds with no criminal conviction. They were wrong to delay this. They should not have needed a political reason to do the right thing,” said Andy Ellis.

On Christmas Eve 2025, ICE agents shot Tiago Alexandre Sousa-Martins in Glen Burnie, then gave a false account of the incident that Anne Arundel County Police publicly contradicted. ICE is building a 1,500-bed detention facility in Washington County, purchased for $102.4 million, and another is being contested in Howard County. At Baltimore’s ICE holding facility, a Maryland lawmaker found 60 men held in a single room with one toilet and no showers, in a facility designed for 12-hour holds. ICE agents continue to operate in Maryland communities in unmarked vehicles, often without identification, and advocates and local officials are trying to find out whether a further surge of federal agents is coming.

Owen Silverman Andrews, candidate for Lieutenant Governor, said the ban addresses a fraction of the problem. “In my activism, I was part of a coalition that ended collaboration between ICE and Howard County law enforcement in 2020. Inaction then persisted for years at the state level, at great cost to immigrants and communities. So while this legislative win is worth celebrating, Marylanders will remember who was responsible for its delay.”

In January, the Ellis/Andrews campaign laid out a four-part plan including ICE abolition, comprehensive sanctuary protections, state-level accountability for ICE agents, and direct legal challenges to ICE conduct by Maryland’s attorney general. The full plan is available at gogreen2026.com/news/abolish-ice.

About the Ellis/Andrews Campaign

Andy Ellis and Owen Silverman Andrews are running for Governor and Lt. Governor on the Green Party ticket. Their campaign is seeking public financing and small donors. Learn more at gogreen2026.com.

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