Specify persons unlawfully present are not privileged from arrest

As Passed by the Senate

136th
General Assembly

Regular
Session
S. B. No. 172

2025-2026

Senator Roegner

Cosponsors: Senators Schaffer,
Johnson, Brenner, Cirino, Gavarone, O'Brien

To
enact section 9.631 of the Revised Code
to
specify that persons who are unlawfully present in the United States
are not privileged from arrest.

BE
IT ENACTED BY THE GENERAL ASSEMBLY OF THE STATE OF OHIO:

Section
1.
That
section 9.631 of the Revised Code be enacted to read as follows:

Sec.
9.631.
(A)
As used in this section:

(1)
"Public office" includes every department, bureau, board,
commission, office, or other organized body established by the
constitution and laws of this state for the exercise of any function
of state government, including any state-supported institution of
higher education, any public school of this state, any court or
judicial agency, or any political subdivision or agency of a
political subdivision. "Public office" does not include the
general assembly or a legislative agency of the general assembly.

(2)
"Public official" includes all elected or appointed
officials, officers, employees, or duly authorized representatives or
agents of a public office.

(B)(1)
Subject to protections afforded under the United States Constitution
and the Ohio Constitution, and notwithstanding any contrary provision
of the Revised Code, no person who is, or is suspected of being,
unlawfully present in the United States is privileged from arrest,
detention, or being taken into or held in custody by a federal,
state, or local law enforcement agency anywhere in this state under
any circumstances, with or without a warrant, and regardless of
whether the proceedings are administrative, civil, or criminal in
nature, for removal or other immigration related purposes or
proceedings.

(2)
This section supersedes any conflicting rule, ordinance, resolution,
policy, or directive enacted or adopted, and any other conflicting
action approved, authorized, decreed, ordered, taken, or permitted,
by a public office or public official before, on, or after the
effective date of this section.

(C)
No public office or public official shall do, or attempt to do, any
of the following:

(1)
Grant any privilege prohibited under division (B)(1) of this section;

(2)
Enforce any rule, ordinance, resolution, policy, directive, or other
action that purports, attempts, or is designed to grant any privilege
prohibited under or superseded by division (B) of this section;

(3)
Obstruct or otherwise interfere, directly or indirectly, with a
federal, state, or local law enforcement agency or officer who is
arresting or detaining a person, taking a person into custody, or
holding a person in custody as permitted under division (B)(1) of
this section;

(4)
Prohibit any person from inquiring or providing information about an
individual's citizenship or immigration status, release date, or
other personal identifying information when doing so is in
furtherance of an immigration enforcement action or otherwise to aid
or cooperate with a federal, state, or local law enforcement agency
or officer in arresting, detaining, taking into custody, or holding
in custody a person who is, or is suspected of being, unlawfully
present in the United States;

(5)
Seek or impose any form of civil or criminal liability or penalty
against any person acting in good faith under this section, including
by holding such a person in contempt of court, ejecting or removing
such a person from a public office or the office's surrounding
grounds, or barring such a person from future access to a public
office or the office's surrounding grounds, on the basis that the
person violated any rule, ordinance, resolution, policy, directive,
or other action that conflicts with or is superseded by division (B)
of this section.