The battle between the Trump administration and "sanctuary cities" for undocumented immigrants in the U.S. is intensifying. Attorney General Jeff Sessions on Monday threatened to strip federal funding from municipalities that harbor undocumented immigrants by refusing to help federal immigration agents, echoing an executive order from President Trump in January.
Philadelphia, a staunch sanctuary city, gets plenty of money annually from the U.S. Department of Justice, with the total reaching about 26-million dollars in the 2015 fiscal year. A spokesperson for Mayor Jim Kenney called Sessions' comments a "direct attack on public safety and explained that undocumented residents are much less likely to call police to report a crime if they know they'll be turned in to Immigrations and Customs Enforcement officials.