RITZVILLE, WA – Washington Attorney General Nick Brown has filed a lawsuit against the Adams County Sheriff’s Office. Brown says the county is “illegally collaborating with federal immigration officials and aiding the Trump administration’s efforts to enlist local officials for federal civil immigration work.”
The lawsuit has been filed in Spokane County Superior Court and says the Adams County Sheriff’s Office has illegally held people in custody based only on their immigration status, helped federal agents question people in custody, and routinely given immigration officials confidential personal information of hundreds of Washingtonians. “All of this conduct expressly violates state law,” the lawsuit says.
Washington law does not interfere with the ability of federal officials to enforce immigration law. Under the Keep Washington Working Act, state law prohibits local law enforcement from providing local aid in that work. Courts have ruled multiple times that states have the ability to restrict such activity with the federal government. The suit is asking for the Adams County Sheriff’s Office to follow Washington law.
“Late last year Adams County was engaged in good faith settlement negotiations with our office,” Brown said. “But after the inauguration of Donald Trump, the county and its Sheriff’s Office suddenly hardened their stance, broke off settlement talks, and aligned themselves with an organization founded by a top Trump aide who is among the most virulent anti-immigrant voices in the administration.”
According to Brown’s Office, in February 2025, the Adams County Sheriff’s Office retained attorneys from America First Legal, an organization founded by Stephen Miller. “Miller is an aide and homeland security advisor to President Trump, who has repeatedly denigrated immigrant families and dismissed the essential role immigrants play supporting our communities and local economy,” says a statement from Brown. “He has repeated white nationalist talking points and is responsible for shaping some of the Trump administration’s most draconian immigration policies, including the infamous family separation policy during the first Trump administration.”
In recent weeks America First Legal issued a press release and launched a social media campaign attacking Washington’s law and topped its website with a scrolling banner saying it was “fighting back” and “combatting Washington State’s Illegal Sanctuary Scheme.”
“Washington has the right and the responsibility to decide for itself how to use its own resources to keep residents safe and the economy strong,” the attorney general’s lawsuit says. “The State cannot stand by when elected officials publicly boast that they are breaking state law and putting their own communities at risk.”
The lawsuit is to enforce the Keep Washington Working Act, which the Legislature passed in 2019. The act is based on a premise that it is not the job of state law enforcement, county sheriffs, or local police departments in Washington to enforce federal immigration law.
Lawmakers were concerned that, if local law enforcement were aiding federal immigration efforts, victims of crimes could be reluctant to call police for help or to report crimes that they witnessed.
The vast majority of law enforcement agencies in the state abide by the law, according to Bworn. The Washington Association of Sheriffs and Police Chiefs (WASPC) sent a letter to its members in February 2025 reiterating that federal and state law must both be followed, and that “no one in our state should fear calling 911 for help due to their immigration status.”
The lawsuit says, “Rather than do the federal government’s job — and absorb the uncompensated fiscal, legal, operational, and community-confidence costs that would come with it — the Keep Washington Working Act (KWW) ensures that Washington’s limited law enforcement resources are best spent enforcing state law, solving crime, and helping ensure the state remains ‘a place where the rights and dignity of all residents are maintained and protected in order to keep Washington working.’”
