This article first appeared in Complete Colorado on April 1, 2026.

“This time, I think, he’s gotten it right,” trumpeted columnist Mike Littwin in the Colorado Sun. He was writing about Mayor Mike Johnston’s February 26 Executive Order No. 152, purporting to stop Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officers from enforcing immigration laws in the City and County of Denver.

Littwin went on to slime the federal agents as “jackbooted ICE thugs.” But let the defamation pass (it’s business-as-usual for the Left) and instead focus on Johnston’s order.

The fact is that Johnston did not, as Littwin claims, “get it right.” On the other hand, ICE didn’t get it right, either, when the agency called Johnston’s order “legally illiterate.”

Johnston knew exactly what he was doing. Legally, he accomplished almost nothing. PR-wise, he was cynically pandering to his ignorant base and the MSNOW media crowd. And appallingly, he was instilling false hope in undocumented immigrants.

To understand why, let’s start with some constitutional background—stuff you don’t learn anymore in government schools or “woke” universities.

Constitutional background

The U.S. Constitution grants federal officials and agencies certain listed (enumerated) powers. It reserves all ungranted powers to the states and the people. If you read the Constitution, you’ll find that left-wing favorites like federal health care, housing, and welfare programs are not within the federal government’s rightful sphere. They survive only because the Supreme Court looks the other way.

On the other hand, immigration control is within the federal sphere. The Constitution granted Congress that authority (to begin after the year 1808) as part of a grant of power to “define and punish . . .Offenses against the Law of Nations.” (Article I, Section 8, Clause 10; Article I, Section 9, Clause 1: “Importation” refers to slaves and “Migration” to free people.)

Once Congress passes a law, the President is obligated—not just permitted—to enforce it (Article II, Section 3). By enforcing immigration laws, President Trump is fulfilling his constitutional duty. He has no power or right to waive a law unless Congress has authorized him to do so.

A historical note might be helpful at this point: Before the “Glorious Revolution” of 1689, English kings sometimes used a “dispensing” power to waive duly-enacted laws. The English Bill of Rights made it clear that such conduct was illegal. When Barack Obama purported to waive parts of the Affordable Care Act and Joe Biden failed to enforce immigration laws, they were acting like the pre-1689 English kings.

So the benighted people frequenting “No Kings” rallies have been protesting the wrong president!

A federal law—including an immigration law—enacted “in pursuance” of the Constitution is the “supreme Law of the Land . . . any Thing in the Constitution or Laws of any State to the Contrary notwithstanding” (Article VI, Section 2).

Under the Constitution, federal immigration enforcement overrides the decrees and desires of state and local officials—even privileged Yalie/Vailee officials like Mike Johnston.

Johnston’s order

Now let’s take a glance at key sections of Johnston’s executive order:

2.1 “All City agencies with authority over physical property shall not allow any City-owned or City-controlled property—including, but not limited to City-owned buildings, parks, parking lots, right-of-ways, and any interior or exterior portion thereof—to be used as a staging area, processing location, or operations base in furtherance of civil immigration enforcement operations, unless the immigration officials have obtained a valid court order, judicial warrant, or as otherwise required by law.”

2.2 “Prohibited uses of City-owned or City-controlled property include assembling, mobilizing, or deploying personnel, vehicles, equipment, or materials for the purpose of civil immigration enforcement.”

2.3 “All City agencies with authority over physical property shall, where appropriate and feasible, incorporate physical barriers such as locked gates and doors to limit access to City-owned or controlled parking lots, vacant lots, garages, and non-public portions of City facilities.”

In rounding up illegal aliens, ICE usually doesn’t use judicial warrants. So at first glance, these provisions seem to ban ICE from using any public spaces—including city streets—for immigration enforcement.

Another section reads:

4.2 “The City shall not allow civil immigration enforcement personnel into non-public spaces or provide information regarding a person’s immigration status without a valid judicial warrant, court order, or as otherwise required by law.”

This seems to oblige city officials to actively obstruct federal immigration enforcement by locking out federal officers. It’s as if you could lock out police officers in hot pursuit of a bank robber. (Don’t try this, by the way.)

Here’s another section in Johnston’s order:

5.1 “Absent indicia of illegal activity or probable cause, civil immigration enforcement personnel may not stop, detain, question or search individuals based on location, occupation, language, accent, race, or ethnicity.”

Of course, police often briefly detain or question people because of where they happen to be, what they are saying, and so forth. It’s part of normal law enforcement and they have full constitutional and legal power to do it. So this provision also seems to obstruct immigration enforcement.

Now, after reading these excerpts, you might think that Johnston’s order is a brazen violation of federal law and the Constitution’s Supremacy Clause. If so, you might be tempted to agree with ICE that the mayor is “legally illiterate.”

A closer look

A closer look at Johnston’s order, however, shows that he’s not that ignorant. Remember: Johnston didn’t get his basic education in a government school. Instead, he attended the elite private Vail Mountain School (current tuition: $36,000 – $41,000 per year). Presumably, it taught him something about the Constitution, even if Harvard and Yale didn’t.

Read Section 2.1 again, and you’ll see that it contains an exception—which necessarily applies to Section 2.2 as well. Section 4.2 contains the same exception.

The exception says that the order’s obstructionist rules don’t apply if immigration officials are acting “as otherwise required by law.”

Now, under a procedure long approved by the U.S. Supreme Court, ICE generally enforces federal law using administrative rather than judicial warrants. When they do so, they are acting “as otherwise required by law.”

In other words, this little exception blasts away almost all the “protection” Johnston purported to give.

As if that weren’t clear enough, read Section 11.1 of the order:

“Nothing in this Executive Order shall be construed or applied to restrict or interfere with the execution of court orders, judicial warrants, or the enforcement of criminal law . . . [N]othing in this Executive Order shall be interpreted to require or permit obstruction of federal immigration enforcement, or to violate the U.S. Constitution’s Supremacy Clause, Intergovernmental Immunity, or other applicable federal laws.”

This provision further guts the order’s “protection.” It exempts criminal law enforcement. As a practical matter, this means it exempts ICE round-ups, because ICE agents are “enforc[ing] the criminal law.” After all, it is a crime to enter the country without authorization, and the law imposes deportation and civil penalties in addition to, not instead of, the criminal penalties.  Moreover, the aliens whom ICE targets generally are guilty of crimes far worse than illegal entry.

Section 11.1 also states that the order is invalid insofar as it violates “the U.S. Constitution’s Supremacy Clause . . . or other applicable federal laws.”

The author of this order is not a “legal illiterate.” He is a cynical grandstander playing to the gullible media (take notice, Mr. Littwin!) and to the terminally ignorant “No Kings” crowd.