Word: arizonas
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...some things that states can do and some that states can't do, but this law threads the needle perfectly," says Kris Kobach, a University of Missouri-Kansas City School of Law professor who helped write the legislation. He believes it will withstand constitutional challenge. "In the bill, Arizona only penalizes what is already a crime under federal law," says Kobach, a Yale Law School graduate and onetime counsel to former U.S. Attorney General John Ashcroft. "That constitutes concurrent enforcement in legal terms, which the courts have said is permissible." Says Mark Krikorian, executive director of the Center for Immigration...
Passions about illegal immigration run high in Arizona, a point of entry for thousands of undocumented workers going to the U.S. from Mexico, and tensions were heightened by the recent murder of a rancher in a remote border area where illegal crossings are rampant. With 6.6 million residents, Arizona's illegal-immigrant population is estimated to be half a million people. (See the great wall of America on the Mexico border...
Both proponents and opponents of the law are vociferous. "This criminalizes undocumented status and turns dishwashers, janitors, landscapers and our neighbors into criminals," says Chris Newman, legal director of the National Day Laborer Organizing Network. "The bill constitutes a complete disregard for the rights of nonwhites in Arizona. It effectively mandates racial profiling." But state senator Russell Pearce, a Republican, says his bill "will not change a thing for lawful citizens. It simply takes the handcuffs off law enforcement and allows them to do their job. Our legal citizens have a constitutional right to expect protection of federal law against...
...Republicans in the lower Arizona house voted for the bill, while 21 Democrats voted against it. The bill passed the state senate earlier. Law enforcement in the state is split over the legislation, with rank and file supporting the measure and the Association of Chiefs of Police in opposition, saying it could hinder investigations by making the immigrant community hesitant to speak with police...
Appalled at the bill's harsh sweep, immigrant advocates are promising court challenges. "This is the most far-reaching anti-immigration bill in memory and it turns the presumption of innocence on its head," says Alessandra Meetze, executive director of the ACLU of Arizona. "It singles out the failure to carry ID as a reason to believe you are an undocumented alien. What this means is that citizens will need to carry papers with them at all times. It means people like my mother, who has brown skin and an accent, can be arrested and detained until it is confirmed...