Key facts
- Houston police may notify ICE only if the person is also arrested and charged with a jailable offense, Whitmire said.
- Whitmire said he consulted Texas's newly elected governor, lieutenant governor and comptroller before issuing the order.
- Police Chief J. Noe Diaz said he supported the change and his department had begun implementing it.
- Whitmire said he hoped the executive order would become a model for other Texas cities.
- Abbott had threatened to withhold at least $110 million in public safety grants over the earlier ordinance effort.
Houston Mayor John Whitmire ordered the city's police department on Friday, November 6, 2026, to curtail cooperation with federal immigration officers, contrary to Republican-backed state law. Whitmire said he acted after consulting with Texas's newly elected governor, lieutenant governor and comptroller, to reduce fear and anxiety across the state's most populous city and because elections matter.
Under the policy, officers conducting routine traffic stops or detaining someone for another reason would be barred from alerting US Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials solely on the basis of a civil immigration warrant. Police could notify ICE only if the person was also being arrested and charged with a jailable offense, the mayor said.
"This is the right thing to do at the right time," Whitmire, a Democrat who voted against the Texas statute banning so-called sanctuary city policies as a member of the state Senate in 2017, said at a news conference announcing his executive order. "I do this to begin a healing process," he said, adding he hoped the order would become a model for other Texas cities.
Houston Police Chief J. Noe Diaz, who joined Whitmire at the news conference, said he supported the change and that his department had already begun to implement the policy.
Whitmire indicated he was no longer concerned about potential retribution from the lame-duck political establishment of Republican Governor Greg Abbott, who lost his bid for a fourth term to Democrat Gina Hinojosa on Tuesday, November 3, 2026. Abbott had threatened to withhold state funding several months earlier when Houston City Council members sought a local ordinance giving officers discretion not to notify ICE when detaining someone subject to a civil immigration warrant. Faced with the potential loss of at least $110 million in public safety grants, city officials retreated, with Whitmire arguing at the time that the city had no choice but to comply.
On Friday, Whitmire said Tuesday's elections had changed the political equation. He said the order enforces Senate Bill 4, which he opposed as a state senator, in line with its supporters' stated goal of cracking down on criminals who are in the country illegally. "We're taking an interpretation of the law today, working with the newly elected members of the state leadership, in implementing this policy," Whitmire told reporters. "We don't want people to worry about their workers, their family members, their students."
It remained unclear how Tuesday's midterm elections, in which Republicans lost control of Congress, might alter the immigration enforcement crackdown launched by President Donald Trump after assuming office for a second term nearly two years ago. The Houston announcement came as Trump promoted his longtime aide Stephen Miller, the architect of his toughest policies on immigration and other domestic issues, as White House chief of staff.