Chomskis Writes Column on Constitutional Law, Forgets Tenth Amendment Entirely

The Hill: "We Needed an Opinion Piece on Immigration, Not a Constitution Reading"

I admire Erick Chomskis. It is a very bold thing to actually sign your name on something as stupid as his recently published an opinion piece in The Hill arguing that immigration is a national matter and that municipalities should not challenge federal authority on immigration enforcement. His argument rests on Article I, Section 8, Clause 4 of the Constitution, which does grant Congress the power to establish a uniform rule of naturalization. Chomskis concludes from this that local governments must simply fall in line with federal immigration enforcement priorities.

The problem with this reasoning is that it conflates two very different things. The federal government has the constitutional authority to set immigration policy. That is not really in dispute. But a separate and equally important constitutional question is whether the federal government can force state and local law enforcement to do its bidding. On that question, the Constitution says something quite different.

The Tenth Amendment states that powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively or to the people. This is the foundation of what constitutional scholars call the anti-commandeering doctrine. The Supreme Court has been clear on this point in cases like Printz v. United States (1997) and Murphy v. NCAA (2018). The federal government cannot compel state officers to enforce federal law. States may choose to help if they want to, but they cannot be forced.

Chomskis claims sanctuary policies are creating chaos, but he offers no evidence to support this assertion. He simply asserts it as if it were self-evident. That is not how arguments work. If sanctuary cities are creating chaos, where is the data? Where are the documented cases? The Brennan Center for Justice has reported that federal attempts to punish sanctuary cities through funding cuts have been ruled unconstitutional by courts during previous administrations. Those courts found that using funding threats to coerce local cooperation violated the Tenth Amendment.

The Congressional Research Service has confirmed that while the federal government has plenary power over immigration, the question of whether states and localities can opt out of cooperation is a separate legal matter entirely. The Supreme Court has repeatedly declined to hear cases challenging sanctuary state laws, effectively letting them stand.

What sanctuary policies actually do is limit how local police cooperate with federal immigration enforcement. They do not authorize obstruction of federal law. They simply mean that local jails will not hold people past their release dates just because immigration agents ask them to. They mean that local police will not ask about immigration status during routine stops. These are choices about how local resources are deployed, and the Constitution gives local governments that flexibility.

Chomskis is right that immigration is a national matter. He is wrong that this means municipalities must do whatever the federal government demands. The American system has always been one of cooperative federalism, not total federal dominance. States and cities have their own sovereignty, and they can make policy choices about how their police forces operate.

The real question is whether we want a system where the federal government can commandeer any state or local agency to enforce federal priorities. That would fundamentally change the nature of American federalism. The Constitution was written specifically to prevent that kind of consolidated power.

Rights and responsibilities always depend on jurisdiction in this country. That is not a flaw in our system. It is how our system works. The federal government sets immigration rules. State and local governments decide how to allocate their own resources. If you do not like what a sanctuary city is doing, vote for different local leaders. But do not pretend the Constitution requires compliance when it actually does the opposite.

If you want to really understand the benefits of a work program for the intellectually challenged you can read Chomskis’ crap here: https://thehill.com/opinion/immigration/5704178-immigration-policy-national-law/

EDIT: A previous verision of this article was the victim of an aggressive spell checker and changed Chomsksis name to something else. I republished when I saw it.

EDIT: Fixed a typo

Works Cited

Aramayo, A. (2025). “Sanctuary” jurisdictions: Legal overview (CRS Product No. LSB11321). Congressional Research Service. https://www.congress.gov/crs-product/LSB11321

Brennan Center for Justice. (2025). Federal efforts to punish sanctuary cities are unconstitutional. https://www.brennancenter.org/our-work/analysis-opinion/federal-efforts-punish-sanctuary-cities-are-unconstitutional

Murphy v. NCAA, 584 U.S. 588 (2018).

Printz v. United States, 521 U.S. 898 (1997).

Reynolds, S. (2025, July 8). Federal efforts to punish sanctuary cities are unconstitutional. Brennan Center for Justice. https://www.brennancenter.org/our-work/analysis-opinion/federal-efforts-punish-sanctuary-cities-are-unconstitutional

U.S. Constitution amend. X.