After a heated back-and-forth between state and local officials over the Austin Police Department’s revised general orders, Austin leaders reversed course Friday and rolled back new limits on police interaction with federal immigration officers after the state threatened to cut off millions in public safety funding.
The policy had been in place for just over a month when Gov. Greg Abbott’s office sent a letter to Mayor Kirk Watson demanding it be reversed or risk losing millions of dollars in state-funded public safety grants. While immigration leaders and activists called on local leaders to stand up to state pressure and keep the policy, Watson and Austin Police Chief Lisa Davis said the potential loss of public safety dollars was too great to ignore, and the limits were weakened. Now, the reversal has raised concerns among some officials and advocates that the changes could lead to more ICE arrests throughout Austin.
“The prospect of a fight might make us feel better,” Watson wrote in a Monday newsletter. “But if the proposed actions are preempted, achieve marginal outcomes, or put a target on Austin’s back — and, therefore, the backs of our people — they’re counterproductive,” he said. “We must lead maturely, intelligently, strategically — even when we’re mad, frustrated, and just plain sick of it all. We cannot, we must not, put the very people we should protect in harm’s way.”
Here’s a breakdown of what we know:
What changed in Austin’s ICE policy
The decision marks a sharp shift from Austin’s recent attempt to give officers more discretion in how they respond to federal immigration requests, and underscores the limits local governments face when state funding and authority are on the line.
The policy change that drew attention from state leaders added language to generally make contacting ICE in cases involving administrative warrants more discretionary. The Trump Administration added in 2025 about 700,000 non-criminal administrative warrants to the National Crime Information Center database.
The general orders directed an officer who encounters one of these warrants to contact their supervisor, and “the officer or the supervisor, as appropriate, may, but is not required to, contact the ICE Law Enforcement Service Center.”
The policy revised on Friday reduces that discretion, saying now an officer or supervisor “should” contact ICE “when operationally feasible” if they have someone in custody. However, it says APD officers are not authorized to make an arrest or detain someone based solely on an ICE administrative warrant.
While both policies indicate officers should not detain a subject for an unreasonable amount of time, the new policy instructs officers to work with ICE when the agency requests time to take someone into custody. The new policy tells officers to ask ICE how much time would be needed for federal agents to arrive and about the urgency of the request, “including whether the person is known to be dangerous or wanted in another country for serious crimes.”
A notable addition to the new policy is that officers “generally will wait and continue to detain the subject if ICE can respond within a reasonable time,” a shift some say could increase immigration-related arrests.
The policy still leaves much of the decision-making to the watch lieutenant, who is instructed to consider factors such as department resources, overtime costs, criminality and the urgency of the request when deciding whether an officer should detain someone for ICE.
City leaders defend decision as critics warn of consequences
In his newsletter, Watson said he is supportive of the changes to the general orders.
“The city and state have come to an agreement that the Chief and I believe is practical for our day-to-day policing, will not create undue harm for residents who are the subject of non-criminal administrative warrants, and preserves funding for critical public safety needs,” Watson said. “While not perfect, and not what I’d do under different circumstances, it’s good policy under these circumstances.”
Others at City Hall were critical of the chief’s and mayor’s decision to cede to the governor’s demands, arguing the revisions to the general orders were in line with the law.
“It’s disappointing to see our city yield to these authoritarian demands by the governor,” District 7 City Council Member Mike Siegel said. “We were doing the absolute best we could do for public safety within the parameters of the law, and instead, the governor took our balanced policy and said it wasn’t enough. It wasn’t pro-ICE enough.”
Siegel said the new general orders may lead to more ICE arrests in the city.
“Previously, it was very clear in giving an officer discretion, which is supposed to be what officers have under state law,” Siegel said. “Now it says that they should … Words matter, so this could change officer behavior.”
According to APD data, ICE has taken custody of a person without a criminal charge from APD seven times since January 2025, including four times last year and three times so far this year. APD said ICE did not take anyone from Austin police custody in 2024.
In addition, APD data shows ICE became involved 17 times from January 2024 to the present after Austin police made non-immigration-related criminal arrests.
State pressure extends beyond Austin
The governor’s office sent letters to three Texas cities over their revised immigration policies: Austin, Dallas and Houston. By Friday evening, all three cities said they would roll back limitations on ICE interaction to avoid funding cuts.
Houston and Dallas faced losing over $110 million and more than $32 million in public safety grants, respectively. Additionally, the governor’s office signaled Dallas could risk losing $55 million in World Cup public safety funding if it didn’t revise its policies.
In a Friday statement, Andrew Mahaleris, Abbott’s spokesperson, told The Texas Tribune the governor’s office lifted the funding hold and “expects full contract compliance moving forward.”
“Governor Abbott has been clear: cities in Texas must fully comply with state law and cooperate with federal immigration authorities to keep dangerous criminals off our streets,” Mahaleris said in the statement to the Tribune.
A day before Austin announced its intention to revise its general orders, Dallas Police Chief Daniel C. Comeaux said the department’s updated policy would affirm it would cooperate with ICE “when required.”
“Our mission has not changed and DPD exists to protect the safety of everyone in Dallas, and we will not stop individuals only to determine their immigration status. Victims and witnesses should continue to feel safe to report crime,” he said in a statement.
Similarly, the Houston City Council voted to roll back an ordinance it had passed in early April that directed police to wait only 30 minutes for ICE agents to arrive if an officer encountered an administrative warrant.
“We have no alternative for Houston to survive,” Houston Mayor John Whitmire said at the start of the city’s Wednesday city council meeting.
