SB 1070 Still A Winner

By Russell Pearce

Opponents of immigration enforcement are calling the temporary injunction against parts of Arizona's anti-illegal-immigration law a death blow to state enforcement. The Mexican American Legal Defense Fund called it a “warning to other states” that want to enact similar legislation.

As the author of the new law, SB 1070, I can honestly say that July 29, when the pared-down law went into effect, was a victory.

Many key provisions are still in effect. Local police have more power to enforce immigration laws. Sanctuary cities are outlawed. Illegal day laborers are likely to be arrested and the employers' trucks that pick them up impounded.

And I am confident the entire law will be upheld.

Already, illegal immigrants are taking notice. Even before the law went into effect, NPR and Reuters reported that undocumented immigrants, including entire families, were moving out of the state. The day after the ruling, CNN reported, “some of the estimated 500,000 undocumented immigrants who went to Arizona are leaving the state.”

This is the strategy of SB 1070: attrition through enforcement. Arizona has made it clear through our policies that illegal immigrants are not welcome, and they are self-deporting from the state.

Judging from media portrayals, one would think this law is the only time that a state has taken up immigration legislation. But this is just the latest bill in Arizona’s string of attrition-through-enforcement legislation.

It began in 2004, when 56 percent of Arizona voters — including 47 percent of Latinos — voted for Proposition 200, which barred illegal immigrants from receiving public benefits. In 2006, voters approved four anti-illegal-immigration and pro-English ballot initiatives. The year after, then-Gov. Janet Napolitano signed the Legal Arizona Workers Act, requiring all employers to use E-Verify to ensure that they do not hire illegal immigrants.

The battles over these laws did not draw as much national attention as SB 1070, but Arizona still faced media campaigns, lawsuits and temporary injunctions. All the laws were eventually enacted.

Even the liberal 9th Circuit Court of Appeals, which is to rule on SB 1070 in November, upheld the legal workers act.

Rather than serve as a warning to other states, our immigration law has inspired people across the country, who are fed up with the federal government's inaction, to follow our lead. Lawmakers in 20 states have now introduced similar legislation. Nine state attorneys general signed an amicus brief in support of Arizona.

The more opponents attack our immigration law, the longer it stays in the national spotlight. This looks likely to be a major issue in the midterm elections. It's almost a prerequisite that any gubernatorial candidate in a Republican primary support SB 1070. Even Democratic candidates, like Roy Barnes of Georgia, support the law.

Poll after poll shows that the majority of Americans support the Arizona law. The day after the injunction, a Rasmussen poll found that 59 percent of American voters wanted an Arizona-style law in their state, while only 32 percent did not.

Despite critics’ claims that SB 1070 interferes with federal law, it actually mirrors federal law, empowering local law enforcement to assist federal authorities. No one denies this. Instead, the court ruled that the law will “impermissibly burden federal resources and redirect federal agencies away from the priorities they have established.”

The “priorities” are not to arrest, detain, prosecute or remove illegal immigrants unless they have already committed serious crimes in addition to illegal presence.

These critics would rather wait for another American to become a victim of crime before they enforce our laws. The only thing that conflicts with federal immigration law is the Obama administration's intentional policy not to enforce it.

With the American people and the Constitution on our side, the temporary ruling of an activist judge will not keep Arizona from prevailing in our fight against illegal immigration.

BREWER on SB 1070, "I will fight all the way to the Supreme Court"

Statement by Governor Brewer on Federal Court decision.

July 28, 2010

“This fight is far from over. In fact, it is just the beginning, and at the end of what is certain to be a long legal struggle, Arizona will prevail in its right to protect our citizens. I am deeply grateful for the overwhelmingly support we have received from across our nation in our efforts to defend against the failures of the federal government.

“I have consulted with my legal counsel about our next steps. We will take a close look at every single element Judge Bolton removed from the law, and we will soon file an expedited appeal at the United States Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit.

“For anyone willing to see it -- the crisis is as clear as is the federal government’s failure to address it.

“The judge herself noted that the stash houses where smugglers hide immigrants from Mexico before bringing them into the country's interior have become a fixture on the news in Arizona and that, ‘You can barely go a day without a location being found in Phoenix where there are numerous people being harbored."

“When I signed the bill on April 23rd, I said, SB 1070 – represents another tool for our state to use as we work to address a crisis we did not create and the federal government has actively refused to fix. The law protects all of us, every Arizona citizen and everyone here in our state lawfully. And, it does so while ensuring that the constitutional rights of ALL in Arizona are undiminished – holding fast to the diversity that has made Arizona so great.

“I will battle all the way to the Supreme Court, if necessary, for the right to protect the citizens of Arizona. Meanwhile, I also know we still have work to do in confronting the fear-mongers, those dealing in hate and lies and economic boycotts that seek to do Arizona harm.

“We have already made some progress in waking up Washington. But the question still remains: will Washington do its job, and put an end to the daily operations of smugglers in our nation, or will the delays and sidesteps continue? I believe that the defenders of the rule of law will ultimately succeed with us in our demand for action

Senate Rejects GOP Bid to Block Arizona Lawsuit

From the Arizona Republic

Our colleage Raju Chebium of the Gannett Washington Bureau contributed the following item.

WASHINGTON – A Republican bid to stop the federal government's lawsuit against Arizona’s
immigration law failed Wednesday.

The vote was 43-55 along mostly partisan lines.

Republican Sens. Jim DeMint of South Carolina and David Vitter of Louisiana sought to prohibit the White House from using federal funds to finance the lawsuit, which the U.S. Department of Justice filed earlier this month. The senators wanted to attach their measure to legislation extending unemployment benefits.

Before the vote, DeMint accused President Barack Obama's White House of trying to “intimidate” Arizona for seeking to enforce federal immigration law.

The federal government failed in its duty to secure the border and Arizona is merely trying to protect its citizens, DeMint said on the Senate floor, adding that the law doesn’t advocate racial profiling but expressly forbids it.

“This is something we know the American people – if they could vote here today – would vote in favor of,” DeMint said. “The question is will the majority vote to support the people of Arizona or to support this political move that we’re now seeing from the White House?”

The Justice Department argues that Arizona is violating the Constitution by trying to usurp the federal government's sole authority to regulate immigration. The lawsuit seeks an injunction to block the law from taking effect on July 29.

South Carolina has joined eight other states – Michigan, Alabama, Florida, Nebraska, Pennsylvania, South Dakota, Texas and Virginia – and the Northern Mariana Islands in filing a legal brief supporting the Arizona law.

The Senate also rejected, by a vote of 39-59, a separate DeMint measure to permanently repeal a real estate tax that critics call the “death tax.”

Sens. John McCain and Jon Kyl, both Arizona Republicans, voted for both DeMint proposals.

Erin Kelly of The Arizona Republic's Washington Bureau contributed to this report.

Democrat Governors Concerned About Obama vs Arizona Lawsuit.

From The New York Times.

July 11, 2010

Governors Voice Grave Concerns on Immigration

By ABBY GOODNOUGH

BOSTON — In a private meeting with White House officials this weekend, Democratic governors voiced deep anxiety about the Obama administration’s suit against Arizona’s new immigration law, worrying that it could cost a vulnerable Democratic Party in the fall elections.

While the weak economy dominated the official agenda at the summer meeting here of the National Governors Association, concern over immigration policy pervaded the closed-door session between Democratic governors and White House officials and simmered throughout the three-day event.

At the Democrats’ meeting on Saturday, some governors bemoaned the timing of the Justice Department lawsuit, according to two governors who spoke anonymously because the discussion was private.

“Universally the governors are saying, ‘We’ve got to talk about jobs,’ ” Gov. Phil Bredesen of Tennessee, a Democrat, said in an interview. “And all of a sudden we have immigration going on.”

He added, “It is such a toxic subject, such an important time for Democrats.”

The administration seemed to be taking a carrot-and-stick approach on Sunday. Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano, in town to give the governors a classified national security briefing, met one-on-one with Jan Brewer, the Republican who succeeded her as governor of Arizona and ardently supports the immigration law.

About the same time as that meeting, Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. said on a taped Sunday talk show that the Justice Department could bring yet another lawsuit against Arizona if there is evidence that the immigration law leads to racial profiling.

Ms. Brewer said she and Ms. Napolitano did not discuss the current lawsuit. Instead, in a conversation she described as cordial, they discussed Arizona’s request for more National Guard troops along the border with Mexico, as well as other resources.

The Democrats’ meeting provided a window on tensions between the White House and states over the suit, which the Justice Department filed last week in federal court in Phoenix. Nineteen Democratic governors are either leaving office or seeking re-election this year, and Republicans see those seats as crucial to swaying the 2012 presidential race.

The Arizona law — which Ms. Brewer signed in April and which, barring an injunction, takes effect July 29 — makes it a state crime to be an illegal immigrant there. It also requires police officers to determine the immigration status of people they stop for other offenses if there is a “reasonable suspicion” that they might be illegal immigrants.

The lawsuit contends that controlling immigration is a federal responsibility, but polls suggest that a majority of Americans support the Arizona law, or at least the concept of a state having a strong role in immigration enforcement.

Republican governors at the Boston meeting were also critical of the lawsuit, saying it infringed on states’ rights and rallying around Ms. Brewer, whose presence spurred a raucous protest around the downtown hotel where the governors gathered.

“I’d be willing to bet a lot of money that almost every state in America next January is going to see a bill similar to Arizona’s,” said Gov. Dave Heineman of Nebraska, a Republican seeking re-election.

But the unease of Democratic governors, seven of whom are seeking re-election this year, was more striking.

“I might have chosen both a different tack and a different time,” said Gov. Bill Ritter Jr. of Colorado, a Democrat who was facing a tough fight for re-election and pulled out of the race earlier this year. “This is an issue that divides us politically, and I’m hopeful that their strategy doesn’t do that in a way that makes it more difficult for candidates to get elected, particularly in the West.”

The White House would not directly respond to reports of complaints from some Democratic governors.

But David Axelrod, the president’s senior adviser, said on Sunday on CNN’s “State of the Union” that the president remained committed to passing an immigration overhaul, and that addressing the issue did not mean he was ignoring the economy.

“That doesn’t mean we can’t have a good, healthy debate about the economy and other issues,” Mr. Axelrod said.

Mr. Obama addressed the economy last week during stops in Kansas City and Las Vegas, and has been calling on Congress to offer additional tax relief to small businesses.

And the heads of Mr. Obama’s national debt commission — Alan K. Simpson and Erskine B. Bowles — were on hand here on Sunday to press the economic issue.

The nation’s total federal debt next year is expected to exceed $14 trillion, and Mr. Simpson, a former Republican senator from Wyoming, and Mr. Bowles, a Democrat and the White House chief of staff under President Bill Clinton, offered a gloomy assessment if spending is not brought under control even more.

“This debt is like a cancer,” Mr. Bowles said. “It is truly going to destroy the country from within.”

Still, the issue of immigration commanded as much attention as anything here this weekend.
Ms. Brewer, who was trailed by television cameras all weekend, called the lawsuit “outrageous” and said the state was receiving donations from around the country to help fight it.
“I think Arizona will win,” she said, “and we will take a position for all of America.”

Immigration was not the only topic at the Saturday meeting between Democratic governors and two White House officials — Patrick Gaspard, Mr. Obama’s political director, and Cecilia Munoz, director of intergovernmental affairs. But several governors, including Christine Gregoire of Washington, said it was a particularly heated issue.

Ms. Gregoire, who does not face an election this year, said the White House was doing a poor job of showing the American public that it was working on the problem of illegal immigration.
“They described for me a list of things that they are doing to try and help on that border,” Ms. Gregoire said of the White House officials at the closed-door meeting. “And I said, ‘The public doesn’t know that.’ ”
She added, “We’ve got a message void, and the only thing we’re hearing is that they’re filing a lawsuit.”

Some Democrats also joined Republicans in calling for Congress to pass an immigration policy overhaul this year.
“There are 535 members of Congress,” said Gov. Brian Schweitzer of Montana, a Democrat. “Certainly somebody back there can chew gum and hold the basketball at the same time. This is not an either-or.”

Gov. Bill Richardson of New Mexico praised the Justice Department’s lawsuit, saying his fellow Democrats’ concerns were “misguided.”
“Policy-wise it makes sense,” said Mr. Richardson, who is Hispanic and who leaves office this year on term limits, “and Obama is popular with Hispanic voters and this is going to be a popular move with them nationally.”

Gov. Martin O’Malley of Maryland — a Democrat who voiced apprehension about the lawsuit in the private meeting, according to the two governors who requested anonymity — said in an interview that he supported it.

“The president doesn’t have control over some of the timing of things that happen,” Mr. O’Malley said. “When those things arise, you can’t be too precious about what’s in it for your own personal political timing or even your party’s timing. When matters like this arise, I think the president has to take a principled stand.”

But Mr. Bredesen said that in Tennessee, where the governor’s race will be tight this year, Democratic candidates were already on the defensive about the federal health care overhaul, and the suit against Arizona further weakened them. In Tennessee, he said, Democratic candidates are already “disavowing” the immigration lawsuit.

“Maybe you do that when you’re strong,” he said of the suit, “and not when there’s an election looming out there.”

Mr. Ritter of Colorado said he wished the Justice Department had waited to sue Arizona until after the law went into effect, to give the public a chance to see how difficult it would be to enforce.

“It’s just an easier case to make,” he said. “I just think that law enforcement officers are going to have a terribly difficult time applying this law in a constitutional way.”

Sheryl Gay Stolberg contributed reporting from Washington, and Katie Zezima from Boston.

Minuteman Founder Offers Support to Arizona & Brewer

Dear Governor Brewer,

You have the full and unconditional support of myself, and the Minuteman Project, regarding Arizona Senate Bill 1070.

I have read the Bill and find it fair, reasonable, and within the spirit of the rule of law.

The Minuteman Project offers its vehement support to SB 1070, Az. State Senator Russell Pearce, and to Governor Jan Brewer. If there is any way you would like the visible support and endorsement of me or the Minuteman Project, please contact us.

Thank you for your tireless efforts to preserve the United State of America as a civilized nation governed by the rule of law.

Sincerely Yours,

Signed by

Jim Gilchrist,
Founder/President - Minuteman Project

The People Say, "Enforce the Law."

Some interesting poll numbers just in on illegal immigration.

With boycotts against Arizona for passage of SB 1070 and daily protests for its repeal, 76 percent of Americans want the number of illegal aliens degreased according to a CNN/Opinion Research Poll conducted May 21-23, this is an increase from the 67 percent who felt the same way in June 2006.

Arizona Governor Jan Brewer seems to have re-ignited the illegal immigration debate when she signed SB 1070 into law, pointing out that the federal government has failed to secure the border between Arizona and Mexico.

President Obama promised his supporters during his 2008 campaign for president that immigration reform would be a priority during his first year in the White House, which included a plan to make illegal aliens legal, instead of using the dreaded A word, amnesty. That would be the same as reducing the number of speeders on the highway by increasing the speed limit. If Obama makes illegal aliens legal aliens we wouldn't have as many illegal aliens.

Most Americans are not buying the Obama plan however, 60 percent want the government to put the emphasis on stopping illegal from entering and deporting those already here. Only 38 percent want them to become legal residents.

Senator John McCain of Arizona, must also have been reading the poll numbers. In 2006, McCain was the poster boy for a plan that would provide a path to citizenship for illegal aliens. Now that he is in a tough primary for the GOP nomination for the senate, he has changed his tune and is broadcasting campaign commercials portraying him as tough on border security.

The CNN poll shows that 88 percent of Americans favor putting more Border Patrol and federal law enforcement on the border, which is up from 74 percent in 2006.

54 percent favor building a 700 mile long fence at the border with Mexico, up from 45 percent in 2006 and 2007.

A whopping majority of Americans are for doing what the federal government won't do, turn off the jobs magnet that is causing people to risk their lives in the deadly Arizona desert to provide cheap labor for greedy employers. 71 percent are in favor of imposing fines of tens of thousands of dollars on employers who knowingly hire illegal aliens, this number is up from 58 percent in 2006 and 47 percent would send those employers to jail for hiring undocumented workers, up from 40 percent in 2006. 70 percent are in favor of creating an ID card issued by the federal government that American citizens and legal residents could use to get jobs.

NBC News and Telemundo, the Spanish language network, also conducted a poll from May 20 to 23 that found that 40 percent of all registered voters would back a Republican candidate who supported Arizona's illegal immigration law which, included 19 percent of Latinos, and 26 percent would back a Democratic candidate who opposed the Arizona law, which included 53 percent of Latinos. 32 percent of all registered voters polled said that the issue would not affect how they voted, 25 percent of Latinos said the same.

The questions I have are, "if we are a federal republic of laws, why are our immigration laws not being enforced?"

"If we are a government by the consent of the governed and the clear majority of the governed want the border secured and employer sanctions against hiring illegal aliens, why, after all these years, has it not happened?"

Bob Haran,
American, Conservative, Republican.

PROUD TO BE AN ARIZONAN

PROUD TO BE AN ARIZONAN.


By Bob Haran;

I'm proud of my state of Arizona, proud of our legislature for passing SB 1070 and of our governor for having the courage to sign 1070 into law.

I'm proud of the majority of the people of Arizona who will not bend under the pressure of the lies and distortions perpetrated against Arizona and our law, good people who are opposed to racism and know the difference between truth and propaganda.

I'm proud to be an American and a citizen of the United States but most of all I'm proud to be a citizen of the Forty-Eights state of these United States of America.

I'm proud to be an Arizonan.