This Week in Bigotry: Starring Arizona!
A giant step backwards indeed. Arizona's House of Reps has voted on a law that makes it a crime to be without proof of citizenship/green card status in the state. It requires police to determine if someone is in the state legally and allows citizens to sue to force the police to respond more assertively in making those determinations.
The law includes phrases like 'reasonable suspicion' that someone is an illegal immigrant. Basically, if you look brown or have an accent you're at risk of stop and demands for proof of citizenship. Since Arizona has a large population of Indians and long term Spanish speaking residents … well, you can see where this goes and quickly.
Current laws allow for a citizen check only if someone is suspected of a crime. This law requires the police check for citizenship even for those not suspected of a crime, allow the general public to sue to force the police to respond more assertively in pursuit of this law and forbid safe-haven practices.
I remember when one of the laws passed in California that targeted illegal immigrants (made it a crime to provide public services to them or something) pizza parlors in Orange County started to refuse service to anyone who looked Mexican. The Arizona laws take the whole bigoted practice of targeting different looking people a new step farther and mandate that the police investigate anyone who might be an illegal immigrant.
The comments on the latimes are rage inducing, I don't recommend them.
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-arizona-immigration14-2010apr14,0,4677282.story
La Raza has a petition:
http://action.nclr.org/p/dia/action/public/?action_KEY=1640
The law includes phrases like 'reasonable suspicion' that someone is an illegal immigrant. Basically, if you look brown or have an accent you're at risk of stop and demands for proof of citizenship. Since Arizona has a large population of Indians and long term Spanish speaking residents … well, you can see where this goes and quickly.
Current laws allow for a citizen check only if someone is suspected of a crime. This law requires the police check for citizenship even for those not suspected of a crime, allow the general public to sue to force the police to respond more assertively in pursuit of this law and forbid safe-haven practices.
I remember when one of the laws passed in California that targeted illegal immigrants (made it a crime to provide public services to them or something) pizza parlors in Orange County started to refuse service to anyone who looked Mexican. The Arizona laws take the whole bigoted practice of targeting different looking people a new step farther and mandate that the police investigate anyone who might be an illegal immigrant.
The comments on the latimes are rage inducing, I don't recommend them.
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-arizona-immigration14-2010apr14,0,4677282.story
La Raza has a petition:
http://action.nclr.org/p/dia/action/public/?action_KEY=1640