Lyon County Sheriff’s Message of the Week on August 8, 2025

Message of the Week 08/08/2025

You may have heard in the news that Nevada is now a sanctuary state, per the Department of Justice. It has been my experience partnering with nearly every law enforcement agency across the State of Nevada at some point in my career that this is not the case. I have received numerous calls asking for information regarding the immigration policy of the Lyon County Sheriff’s Office. Lyon County is certainly NOT a sanctuary County.

During my tenure as Sheriff, and regardless of what party is in office in Washington, D.C. the Lyon County Sheriff’s Office has always partnered with our Federal agencies. These partnerships include assisting with immigration enforcement, drug enforcement, gang enforcement, child porn and exploitation enforcement, human trafficking enforcement, and burglary/robbery investigations.

The Lyon County Sheriff’s Office commitment to upholding the law and assisting our law enforcement partners, Federal or State, will not waiver or change with the political winds.

The Nevada Attorney General has published model immigration policies, mandated by the Nevada Legislature, providing recommendations for state and local entities. The link above will take you to the document titled “Model Immigration Policies”. The Attorney General states this is only a model, and not a mandate. Below is an excerpt from the document describing the model immigration policy law enforcement should follow:

“[LEA] will not perform or support the functions of a federal immigration agent or otherwise engage in immigration enforcement activities, whether on its own accord, pursuant to informal arrangements, or under an agreement made pursuant to 8 U.S.C. § 1357(g) if such agreement violates state or local law or policy. a. Nothing in this section prohibits [LEA] and [LEA] personnel from cooperating with or assisting a federal immigration agent in an officer safety capacity, such as traffic control, during immigration enforcement activities, if prior approval is received from [LEA sheriff, chief of police, or agency head]. b. [LEA] personnel will not participate in any immigration enforcement activities except in an officer safety capacity, such as traffic control, if preapproved by [LEA sheriff, chief of police, or agency head].”

The Lyon County Sheriff’s Office operates opposite of this model policy. I have issued a standard order that our Deputies and Detention facility will support Federal Immigration Officers in any operation within Lyon County. The Detention facility cooperates with Federal Immigration authorities in accordance with the law when placing immigration holds on those who are incarcerated within our jail. As recently as Tuesday, immigration authorities took custody of a validated gang member who was in the Country illegally and incarcerated in our jail on burglary charges.

Respectfully,

Sheriff Brad Pope