What do we think?

http://ow.ly/1Ct7s

-- Key provisions of Arizona's immigration legislation, signed into law by Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer on Friday:

- Makes it a crime under state law to be in the country illegally by specifically requiring immigrants to have proof of their immigration status. Violations are a misdemeanor punishable by up to six months in jail and a fine of up to $2,500. Repeat offenses would be a felony.

- Requires police officers to "make a reasonable attempt" to determine the immigration status of a person if there is a "reasonable suspicion" that he or she is an illegal immigrant. Race, color or national origin may not be the only things considered in implementation. Exceptions can be made if the attempt would hinder an investigation.

- Allow lawsuits against local or state government agencies that have policies that hinder enforcement of immigration laws. Would impose daily civil fines of $1,000-$5,000. There is pending follow-up legislation to halve the minimum to $500.

- Targets hiring of illegal immigrants as day laborers by prohibiting people from stopping a vehicle on a road to offer employment and by prohibiting a person from getting into a stopped vehicle on a street to be hired for work if it impedes traffic.

- The law will take effect by late July or early August.

all sorts of Constitutional problems. equal protection, 4th amendment, etc. perhaps failing for vagueness and overbreadth in that it puts the cops in a really tough position and will sweep in way too many people.

will be interesting to see what happens.

Yup. Wonder how many potentially illegal white immigrants would get stopped and scrutinized.

Star of David, FTW

I don't think gassing or mass genocide is really part of the law itself.

rparis, can you clarify the equal protection issue for the idiots here (me)?

i'd argue that this law classifies people on the basis of both race and national origin and will put a greater burden on non-caucasians if that person looks like they could be an illegal immigrant. If you were able to win that argument, then the court would use strict scrutiny review. Under this level of review, if the law categorizes on the basis of race or national origin (or infringes a fundamental right) the law is unconstitutional unless it is narrowly tailored to serve a compelling government interest. In addition, there cannot be a less restrictive alternative available to achieve that compelling interest. However, the big hurdle would be that under the 14th amendment, the challenger has to show proof of racially discriminatory intent or purpose by the government. Disparate impact is only evidence of intent (unlike Title VII challenges).

The courts also apply strict scrutiny to classifications made on the basis of alienage (citizens vs. non-citizens) but getting that level of review would be even tougher here as this law looks to harass people if they look like an illegal, regardless of what they really are.

If you can get this level of review, government action is almost always struck down.

If you were only able to get rational basis review, you'd have to show that the AZ government had some sort of irrational desire to harm illegals based on politics and not good policy (see Romer case).

Equal protection means the government can't have different standards for different peoples or treat them differently under the law.

I'm coming to Obner to run away from this kind of talk.

This is great. Those libertarian Repubs have again limited government interference into our lives (you can't stop your car and talk to someone about a job) and expanded our freedoms (if you wear the wrong shoes you may be stopped by the cops). I wonder what Barry Goldwater woulda said about this.

Politically this is also welcome, from a cynical destroy-the-Repubs perspective. As the emerging latino majority (which delivered Colorado and Florida to O in 2008) pushes the troglodyte Repub judgement to redline on the illogic scale it reminds latino voters and the centrist O base (including those sexy independents) that there is something dark and racist inherent in the teabag fringe that pretty much runs the Republicans. This continues the trends established in the 2008 election that the emerging majority of color (projections are putting this closer to 2040 than 2050) will be lost to the American Taliban. Energizing the Dems with a national debate over immigration (even though Obama's immigration reforms are pretty much liberal Republican themselves) will mitigate some of the impact of bad economy and natural mid-term national election loses. For example, getting latinos really pissed off could mean Boxer gets reelected in CA.

I agree with you Harry.

All of these border "protections" are really just Alesian walls.

I hate this law too but I think Harry's line of thinking is wishful thinking on his part. The hardcore anti-immigration movement is very vocal but I don't think its much more than a fringe element of the repub party. Tom Tancredo found very little support when trying to run for the party nom on the issue. McCain by contrast had voted for the amnesty bill even though he represents a border state. Similarly, Jeff Flake of AZ had voted to relax immigration quotas and for guest worker programs. Meg Whitman who will surely be the repub gubnatorial candidate is being ineffectually attacked by her opponent for having the same immigration position as Obama. Carly Fiorina, one of the repub candidates for senate appears to be very pro-immigration having been very vocal about the need for increasing H1B visas. I don't know Tom Campbell's immigration views but he's pretty liberal in general so I'd be surprised if he's anti-immigration nut. As far as the teaparty movement goes, I don't think there's unity on the issue. I'm sure that it attracks the anti-estabilishment, anti immigrant whackos but it also probably attracks the leave us alone, libertarian minded folks too who are more likely than not, pro-immigrant.

There's not unity in the teabag movement about keeping the mex-cans out? Really?

Ron Paul's Libertarians are tolerant of immigrants? Really?

Campbell introduced legislation to declare English the official language of the US and outlaw bilingual materials etc.

Conservatives can't waffle out of this contradiction in their positions and hide the inherently xenophoic fear-based warp of their thinking.

i'm totally against this, only because i LOVE fresh made tortilla's, and if this goes through, and spreads into other states, there goes my access to freshly made tortillas.

They were making tortillas in what is now New Mexico when your ancestors in the forests of Europe were wrapping their feet in grass.

tortillas are so much better than all of Europe. seriously.

Ron Paul is bad on this issue but its an area he diverts from libertarian views and I think its fair to say that many people who support Paul on the whole disagree strongly with his views on immigration.




The English as official language legislation never botherd me much. All the xenophobes support it but so do a lot of people who support immigration but think immigrants should be integrated into US society and be forced to learn and speak english. In any case, Dems are in the pocket of big labor and are far from pure on the issue of immigration.

sf/oakland was going off yesterday

i wonder what tom errico has to say about this matter

Just ask ShamWow

Have you just outed Billzebub as tomarico?