New Hampshire’s Republican Gov. Kelly Ayotte signed a pair of bills into law Thursday that place bans on sanctuary city polices in the Granite State.
“There will be no sanctuary cities in New Hampshire,” Ayotte said during the bill signing, according to New Hampshire Bulletin. “Period. End of story.”
The two bills that are now law — House Bill 511 and Senate Bill 62 — ban municipalities and counties in the state from putting in place policies that prevent local officials and police from cooperating with federal immigration officials such as Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).
Among other requirements, House Bill 511 requires local governments to comply with ICE detainers and bans cities from making policies that would refuse to recognize immigration directives. For its part, Senate Bill 62 prohibits cities from passing rules preventing police departments from entering into resource agreements with ICE.
At the signing, Ayotte again took aim at Massachusetts, New Hampshire’s left-wing neighboring state, as her imputes for pursuing anti-sanctuary policies.
“This is something we ran on to make sure that New Hampshire would not go the way of Massachusetts,” the governor said, “and their billion-dollar illegal immigration crisis.”
When she was elected last year, Ayotte pledged to put an end to sanctuary policies and charged the legislature with moving quickly on the issue. Ayotte also said she would not “MASS up” New Hampshire after seeing how badly Massachusetts was mired in illegal migrants and illegal drug trafficking.
State GOP leaders praised Ayotte for her efforts to spearhead the anti-sanctuary bills.
“I look at the governor and I think, wow,” said Republican state Sen. Bill Gannon. “She made promises. She kept them. She did that with bail reform. Check. Sanctuary city bills today. Check.”
“We are sending a clear message to the state of New Hampshire today that if you’re in this nation illegally, you are not welcome in the state of New Hampshire,” added Republican rep. and House Majority Leader Joe Sweeney.
The anti-sanctuary bills were highly popular in the state Senate and House. In February, the House passed its bill in a landslide vote with a bipartisan 351 to 6 majority.
The state House, which has been controlled by Republicans for eleven out of the last 15 years, currently boasts 221 Republicans facing 171 Democrats, giving the GOP a 50-seat majority. The GOP holds the Senate, as well. Since 2011, Democrats only held a majority in the upper chamber twice; in 2019 and 2020.
New Hampshire is also by far the largest legislative body in the country, with a massive 400 members representing 203 legislative districts. The next closest is Pennsylvania, which at 203 has about half as many as New Hampshire.
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