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Republican lawmakers accused Fairfax County’s top prosecutor and sheriff of jeopardizing public safety by limiting cooperation with federal immigration authorities, setting off a tense congressional hearing Thursday in which both officials forcefully rejected the allegations.

Fairfax County Commonwealth’s Attorney Steve Descano and Sheriff Stacey Kincaid told the House Judiciary Subcommittee on Immigration Integrity, Security, and Enforcement that immigrants receive no preferential treatment from their offices.

Descano said his office prosecutes crimes committed in Fairfax County regardless of a defendant’s immigration status. He argued that enforcing Virginia criminal law is his office’s responsibility, while federal civil immigration enforcement belongs to Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

The hearing centered heavily on the killing of Stephanie Minter, a Fredericksburg resident who was fatally stabbed earlier this year at the Hybla Valley bus station. Abdul Jalloh, an undocumented immigrant from Sierra Leone who had a history of arrests, was charged with second-degree murder.

Minter’s mother, Cheryl Minter, testified against the county’s policies. She recently began working with groups seeking to recall Descano.

She said her daughter’s accused killer had repeatedly been arrested and was known to pose a danger but remained free. Calling for accountability, she said the system had failed her daughter.

Although participants broadly agreed that a failure had occurred, they sharply disagreed about who bore responsibility. Republicans blamed Descano’s policies, while Descano pointed to the Department of Homeland Security’s decision to release Jalloh from custody during the first Trump administration.

Kincaid also faced questions about a Sheriff’s Office policy that bars the jail from holding inmates beyond their release dates unless an ICE administrative detention request is accompanied by a court-issued criminal detainer.

She said her office is neither funded nor required to perform the federal government’s immigration-enforcement duties. Its state- and locally approved budget supports operation of the detention center, courthouse security and the service of civil process.

Kincaid maintained that the Sheriff’s Office continues to cooperate with ICE in the same manner as other law-enforcement agencies. She said ICE agents may enter the jail at any time and are notified whenever an undocumented immigrant is booked.

According to Kincaid, ICE can take custody by obtaining a judicial warrant, asking when an inmate will be released, monitoring court dates or assuming custody as early as five days before release. Her office also coordinates high-risk transfers when ICE requests assistance, she said.

Former Virginia Attorney General Jason Miyares and Sean Kennedy, a Fairfax County Criminal Justice Advisory Board member and president of Virginians for Safe Communities, also testified against the county’s approach.

Kennedy argued that Descano’s immigration-consequences policy has allowed repeat violent and sexual offenders to victimize county residents. The policy directs assistant commonwealth’s attorneys to consider immigration consequences when possible and when consistent with justice.

Other witnesses defended limits on local cooperation with ICE. David Bier, chair of the Selz Foundation in Immigration Policy, and Jane Stoever, a University of California, Irvine School of Law professor, said localities have legitimate legal reasons for imposing such restrictions.

Bier said several courts have ruled that states cannot detain people solely at ICE’s request. He cited more than a dozen settlements involving people held by local governments on immigration detainers, including one case in Virginia.

Without a court order supported by probable cause, Bier said, state and local authorities generally cannot arrest or detain someone merely because federal immigration officials requested it unless those authorities have been deputized by ICE. He said some jurisdictions are labeled sanctuaries simply for following those court rulings.

The hearing, titled “Fairfax County, Virginia: The Dangerous Consequences of Sanctuary Policies,” took place as the Trump administration investigates Descano’s office. In early May, the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division opened an inquiry into its practice of considering immigration status during charging, plea and sentencing decisions.

Descano also belongs to a coalition of prosecutors that has pledged to curb what it describes as unlawful conduct by the administration.