When Charlotte’s City Council met last Monday, members confronted a reality shared by cities and counties across North Carolina: immigrant communities shaken by recent federal immigration raids, and local governments with little room to respond.
The meeting came as federal agents carried out operations in several parts of the state, including Durham and Raleigh. The arrests prompted parents to keep children home from school, workers to miss shifts and families to avoid public spaces.
As council members described fear rippling through neighborhoods, they also acknowledged the limits of their authority.
“The city of Charlotte only has as much power as is explicitly granted or inherently granted by the General Assembly’s general statutes,” City Attorney Andrea Leslie-Fite told members. “So when it comes to things of this magnitude, or anything else for that matter, we first have to look to the authority that’s been granted … and the limitations.”
Those limits stem from North Carolina’s strict interpretation of Dillion’s Rule, which gives cities only the powers the legislature explicitly approves. Unlike “home-rule” states, where municipalities have broad authority to pass local ordinances without seeking state approval, North Carolina municipalities cannot set their own immigration policies, restrict cooperation with federal agents or adopt “sanctuary” ordinances.
“It’s like two different types of parenting,” said Rick Su, a professor at the University of North Carolina School of Law who studies the intersection of cities and immigration. “One is like, you do whatever you want, but when you do something wrong, then I’m going to punish you. The other is like, don’t do anything, and ask me for permission before you do anything.”
Lawmakers in Raleigh have repeatedly moved to shape immigration policies in the state, passing bans on sanctuary policies and backing measures that would require sheriffs to cooperate with federal authorities. As a result, cities from Raleigh and Durham to Greensboro and Winston-Salem operate under the same constraints as Charlotte, regardless of local political consensus.
Even so, Charlotte officials outlined several steps they believe fall within their authority. The city will require judicial warrants for federal agents seeking access to nonpublic city facilities. Other measures include protecting confidential data where possible and scrutinizing public-record requests. Officials also debated direct funding for community organizations assisting immigrant families.
On the policing side, the city’s police officers will not participate in immigration arrests but can verify the identities of federal agents, respond to reports of possible immigration activity and investigate any criminal behavior.
Still, immigrant advocates say municipalities could do more. “There’s so much creativity and wisdom in local government,” Andrew Willis Garces, a senior strategist with Siembra N.C., told NC Newsline.
“If officials got in rooms across jurisdictions and asked, ‘What would it take to make this state the safest for immigrants in the South?’ they could make a list of things to do now,” Garces told NC Newsline in an interview.
Garces said municipalities could hold public hearings on how federal actions are affecting communities, direct city managers to produce reports on what they learn, and adopt local resolutions protecting workplace rights and Fourth Amendment guarantees. He noted that Durham, Chapel Hill and Greensboro have already committed to the “Stand Up for Greensboro, Chapel Hill, Durham” resolution.
Su agreed. He said that while the state’s framework is narrow, many cities interpret it even more restrictively than the law requires. Municipalities, he said, often underestimate the authority they do have.
“I think sometimes city attorneys and politicians in North Carolina imagine themselves as having even less power than they do,” he said. Cities still possess regulatory tools they routinely use in other contexts — and those tools can apply to federal agencies as well.
For example, Su said North Carolina cities can use zoning and safety reviews for buildings used by federal authorities, audits of contracts or land-use agreements for shared facilities, and standard identification requirements for anyone operating in nonpublic, city-controlled spaces. These are not immigration policies, he said, but ordinary exercises of municipal authority that apply to everyone.
“These are not about obstructing immigration enforcement,” he said. “They’re about cities exercising the powers they already have — zoning, property control and general regulatory authority — which they use in every other context.”
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