A federal judge has spoken: Arizona can not help the federal government in enforcing laws that it does not enforce well. Or at least this is the message that we can pull from the arguments (from the Associated Press article).
“Requiring Arizona law enforcement officials and agencies to determine the immigration status of every person who is arrested burdens lawfully-present aliens because their liberty will be restricted while their status is checked,”
So does this mean if I’m pulled over for speeding, MY liberties are being restricted while my legal driving and registration status is checked? Newsflash for the judge: The law requires someone to be arrested for another reason, and if the officer feels that the person might be here illegally, they then check for identification of this. Just so we are clear, no rounding up people to check ID, just checking once they’ve been caught for something. Courts go based on precedence, and this sets a bad one in Arizona, and across the nation, that a minor inconvenience is more important than sovereignty and national security.
“I knew the judge would say that part of the law was just not right,” said Diaz, a 50-year-old from Mexico City who came to Arizona on a since-expired tourist visa in 1989. “It’s the part we were worried about. This is a big relief for us.”
Aren’t you so glad that someone who came here under the disguise of a tourist, and that has remained here for the next 20 years illegaly is relieved? I know I am. This is a perfect example of someone who premeditated a crime, acted upon it, and now has one more defense to stay here. Does anyone else see a problem here?
Federal lawyers said the law is disrupting U.S. relations with Mexico and other countries and would burden the agency that responds to immigration-status inquiries.
What? WHAT? WHAT?! We are worried that other countries who make zero effort to work with us on reducing the flow of illegals to our country, are not going to like us as much for having laws that are still not as harsh as theirs? We’re worried that Mexico might be angry with us? What are they going to do? Build a wall so none of their people can come here illegally?
Responding to the ruling, Justice Department spokeswoman Hannah August said that the agency understands the frustration of Arizona residents with the immigration system. She added that a wide range of state and local policies would seriously disrupt federal immigration enforcement.
What I want to know is before all of these “policies” what disrupted them? And how do they understand Arizonan’s frustration? Are they paying Arizona for the costs of the illegal aliens? Are they dealing with the traffic on a daily basis? Right… “understands”. Until they empathize, I don’t think they will every really understand.
“Jan Brewer played politics with immigration, and she lost,” Arizona Attorney General Terry Goddard, a Democrat. “It is time to look beyond election year grandstanding and begin to repair the damage to Arizona’s image and economy.”
This is great! The Arizona AG, from a different party (Democrat) than the governor doesn’t like election year grandstanding. What the article fails to point out, as well as the irony of this is Terry Goddard is running for governor. And what did he do? Weighed in on this issue that his side has made a race-issue, and therefore ingratiated himself through his own grandstanding to a perceived segment of the population. Can you say hypocrite? But this is just what we have seen all along – In a mid-term election year, they vehemently oppose a law that only adds more enforcement to an existing law on the books, but is heavily opposed by one demographic which happens to be populous in certain areas. All Arizona is trying to do is stop the bleeding… or at least close the sucking chest wound. The best the president and his party can do is talk about “comprehensive reform” and do nothing about it, while suing a state that just wants to protect itself from people who have no legal reason to be there.
Filed under: Politics Tagged: | 1070, Arizona, Brewer, Centrist, Conservative, Democrat, federal, Goddard, illegal, immigration, Indepependent, liberal, Mexico, moderate, Politics, republican, SB, Third, united states
It is not a total loss, the only things blocked were the controversial “papers please” parts. The parts about e-verify and hiring are good to go. Also note, this is just a temporary injunction. While it gives some indication of how the judge is thinking, it is hardly a victory as the final ruling can be much different.
In the end, we all know how this is going play out… bitter accusations of activist judges.
Terrant,
Thanks for your comment. Yet another blogger on my blogroll (top right) who writes much better pieces, if you want to head on over.
I truly fear activist judges. In our country we have the three areas of government. I won’t go into them, but the Judicial is supposed to interpret and enforce the existing laws, and decide if they have been either broken, or are unconstitutional. Since Arizona did not break the law, that was satisfied, and they did not overstep constitutional bounds as well. So this was purely a judge who put feelings and fears ahead of law, order, and reason. Scary.
This is disappointing to say the least, but Jan Brewer isn’t going to back down. The fight has just begun. This all could go away easily if the federal government would just start enforcing the laws that are already on the books, but instead Barack Obama is going to use this to push amnesty.
Steve,
Thanks for stopping by. For those of you who don’t know him, you can check out his blog (much better written, and far more interesting) over here: http://www.americaswatchtower.com .
I think we could have so many fewer laws on the books, and far fewer problems if the laws were just enforced. I agree with you: This administration is aiming at amnesty, and therefor enforcement of the law is counter to their designs.
You make some excellent points. The difficulty (as always) is the quality of the police and the supporting bureaucracy…
As with virtually ALL rules and legislation – if this law CAN be abused by authority, it WILL be abused and that’s where anyone “foreign looking” (or even “I think you look foreign to me, sir…”) will likely be “arrested” on any old trumped-up charge in order that a racist cop can check on them and perhaps take a long time doing so.
That WILL happen, which is a shame, because except for the likely shortcomings of the officials involved, I agree with you. It will almost certainly be yet another example of the assholes spoiling everything for everyone.
Hey Quin,
Abuse is always a fear, but that was the fear when police were allowed to use “probable cause” for crimes, and that lead to other charges as well. While there were abuses, for the extreme majority, there weren’t. Arizona’s laws still allow for those defenses.