Pennsylvania sheriff says he's being slandered with 'Holocaust-era language' over ICE alliance

PHILADELPHIA — Bucks County Sheriff Fred Harran says some opponents of his plan to have the department partner with ICE have used "Holocaust-era language" to slander him as the state's only Jewish sheriff.

In a statement shared with The Inquirer this week, as civil-rights groups prepared for a Wednesday news conference to oppose an ICE alliance, Harran said the rhetoric was "deeply offensive and has no place in Bucks County."

Asked who was making such remarks, a sheriff's department spokesperson cited a recent public meeting where a woman called Harran a Nazi, in addition to postings on the department's Facebook page. Commenters there said Harran was behaving "as a Nazi" and making his department part of "the modern-day Gestapo."

"You sound like a Nazi sympathizer, or collaborator, and you know what happened to them once the forces of good overpowered the forces of evil," one woman wrote.

Another asked, "Will you be renaming the department appropriately? The Bucks County Gestapo?"

At a hearing last week on student online safety in Northampton Township, a woman stood up and asked Harran if he planned to "round up immigrants," called him a Nazi, and warned him to stay out of the community, reported NewtownPAnow.com.

Bucks department may join 287(g) program

Harran's Holocaust-language comment was a small part of a longer statement released by the sheriff's department in which he defended his plan to have deputies help ICE enforce federal immigration laws.

"Unfortunately, misinformation has overshadowed the facts," Harran said. "Let me be clear: this is about public safety, not politics. It's disheartening to see deliberate falsehoods and personal attacks, including being slandered with Holocaust-era language simply for doing my job. As the only Jewish sheriff in Pennsylvania, this kind of rhetoric is deeply offensive and has no place in Bucks County."

The department intends to join a partnership program known as "287(g)," where local police actively assist U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement. The Bucks department would be the first in the Philadelphia region to collaborate with ICE under the initiative, named for a section of a 1996 immigration law.

Harran insisted the alliance would not be used "for immigration sweeps, random checks, or broad enforcement," but that "those who commit crimes must face the consequences regardless of immigration status."

ICE officials said Tuesday that they had no comment.

Opponents say participation in the 287(g) program inevitably leads to racial profiling by local police. They maintain it fractures trust between police and the communities they serve, and deprives local taxpayers of the full services for which they're paying.

The rancorous debate in Bucks County comes as President Donald Trump seeks to carry out what he claims will be the largest deportation effort in American history, one in which he has called on state-and-local law-enforcement agencies for help.

Many are responding. As of Tuesday, ICE has signed 517 agreements — up by more than 50 in roughly the last two weeks — with police in 39 states.

Opposition to ICE planned Wednesday

In Bucks County, leaders from Immigrant Rights Action, NAACP Bucks County, Make the Road Pennsylvania, CASA, and the ACLU plan to voice their opposition at a news conference scheduled for 9:30 a.m. Wednesday at the Justice Center in Doylestown.

They and what they predict will be a large group of local residents then plan to attend the Board of Commissioners meeting, where they'll raise questions about the potential impact on taxpayers.

"This isn't something the community supports," Heidi Roux, executive director of Immigrant Rights Action, said in a statement. "The trust we have built between our immigrant community and law enforcement will be completely shattered. I am shocked that the sheriff would even consider it."

Harran has described his department's involvement as a "narrowly defined initiative focused on public safety," one in which 12 of the department's 76 deputies would be trained to access a federal immigration database, identifying people taken into custody on criminal charges and who have outstanding warrants in Bucks County.

But immigration activists and civil-rights groups dispute that, saying the program would allow sheriff's deputies to ask anyone about their legal status and to serve warrants for immigration violations, turning local officers into de facto ICE agents.

Opponents say 287(g) enables discriminatory policing, and that, as NAACP Bucks County President Adrienne King said, "allowing local law enforcement to enforce federal immigration laws is a dangerous move."

"The government should prevent law-enforcement from investigating and detaining people based on their color or accent, not mandate it," she said.

A 2022 ACLU study of all 142 state and local police departments then participating in 287(g) said the program emboldens officers "to racially profile — stopping and arresting people on the pretext of traffic violations or other minor offenses — for the actual purpose of putting them in a pipeline to deportation."

Kierstyn Zolfo, a leader of Indivisible Bucks County, said in a statement that she and others plan to ask the commissioners about the impact of 287(g) on the county budget.

"ICE may pay for training, but it doesn't cover officer salaries, overtime, or benefits," she said.

ICE rejected in Bensalem

Harran described the program as a money-saver, saying that transferring immigration prisoners to federal custody would free county taxpayers from the financial burden of having to jail and transport them.

The department is continuing to talk to members of immigrant communities, faith leaders, and other stakeholders "to ensure the initiative's purpose is clear and its effectiveness shared," he said.

Jurisdictions that have rejected the 287(g) program say that they pay their police officers to enforce local laws and assist local residents, not to do the work of the federal government.

They fear losing the cooperation of immigrant crime victims and witnesses. And some police departments dropped out of the program after Lehigh County and Allentown authorities were successfully sued for keeping a man of Puerto Rican descent in prison — even after he posted bail — so that ICE could investigate whether he was in the country illegally.

That settlement cost taxpayers $145,000.

In Bucks County, efforts to partner with ICE have failed before.

In 2018, elected leaders in Bensalem, where Harran was then director of public safety, argued that the community would be safer if police helped enforce immigration laws. They said officers would be able to identify and arrest dangerous criminals without infringing on individual rights or even bothering law-abiding, undocumented immigrants.

Bensalem officials dropped the proposal after it drew wide opposition.