Holder: Feds may sue over Arizona immigration law

[TomCADem]

Source: CNN

Washington (CNN) -- Attorney General Eric Holder said Sunday that the Justice Department was considering a federal lawsuit against Arizona's new immigration law.

"We are considering all of our options. One possibility is filing a lawsuit," Holder told NBC's "Meet the Press." Possible grounds for the lawsuit would be whether the Arizona law could lead to civil rights violations, he said.

The recently enacted Arizona law allows police to ask anyone for proof of legal U.S. residency. Critics say the law will lead to racial profiling, while supporters say it involves no racial profiling and is needed to crack down on increasing crime involving illegal immigrants.

In Arizona, the city councils of Tucson and Flagstaff have decided to challenge the new immigration law in court.

Read more: http://www.cnn.com/2010/POLITICS/05/09/holder.arizona.immigration/

[PSPS]

1. "supporters say it ... is needed to crack down on increasing crime involving illegal immigrants"

The recently enacted Arizona law allows police to ask anyone for proof of legal U.S. residency. Critics say the law will lead to racial profiling, while supporters say it involves no racial profiling and is needed to crack down on increasing crime involving illegal immigrants.

Gee, that's odd. Just yesterday there was this story quoting officials who are actually located in border towns like Nogales who said crimes involving "illegal immigrants" weren't even significant and, in fact, have been decreasing for a long time. There have been numerous other studies, as well as FBI crime statistics, that confirm this. Even CNN had this story about the decreasing crime rate.

This ersatz voter-caging scheme by Brewer is just the first of many attempts to suppress democratic voters.

[pinboy3niner]

2. Excellent post nt

[EFerrari]

6. Precisely. n/t

[Igel]

7. I've nearly given up trying to make sense of reportorial hash.

Why?

Well, crime is down overall in AZ. It's down in Nogales.

On the other hand, it's down in Nogales over the same period that a very large fence was put up and lots more border patrol agents started keeping the traditional Nogales-Tucson corridor "clean." All things being equal, you expect it to be down.

But there are also constant defenders of "there's no cross-border violence" citing the fact that, overall, near-border violence has remained flat.

Down overall in the state. Down in Nogales. But on average, flat. If true, then there's something special about the parts of the border that aren't in or near Nogales. And that something is that crime's increased. Unpleasant inference, that. On the other hand, it's not always claimed that border crime is flat. Sometimes it's simply unstated, or we're left to infer that since it's down in Nogales it must be down everywhere. The facts are nearly disintegrating under their angular momentum. Worse is the selective reporting of facts. The truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth? Hardly. At least one strike, probably two, and possibly three.

But the "violence is flat at the border" also comes with a caveat: That the coyotes and cartels don't piss in their own well. Make a mess at the border, you get enforcement at the border. So the claim is that the crime rate's up not there, but in urban centers where business would be conducted, where the chickens are released by the coyotes. Can't tell much, because unidentified assailants and those not caught tend not to have their immigration status checked. The invisible aren't inviolate wrt incarceration, but they're harder to spot.

[Jefferson23]

3. So what percentage of the Republican party will support cracking down

on businesses that employ them and also exploit them to increase their profits?

Any Republican lurkers out there, feel free to respond!

[dkf]

4. Why can't Arizona sue the Feds for lack of enforcement?

Really this is all the federal governments fault. It's a conspiracy to find cheap labor and keep wages for non-elite Americans stagnant. Oversupply of labor has always been the market solution to labor costs.

[Igel]

8. Sovereign immunity.

The right to enforce implies the right not to enforce. As long as it's done Constitutionally, i.e., without racial or ethnic bias.

There's also the matter of standing. Does Arizona have a right to sue? Does it have Constitutional rights?

Etc.

[christx30]

9. So the feds

can just do whatever they want and the people of Arizona just have to live with it, begging for something to be done? Jerks in Washington don't have to live with the mess that was created by NAFTA. People in border states like Arizona and Texas do.

[still_one]

5. Then do it holder instead of babbling what you may or may not do. /nt

[MIprogressive1]

10. After seeing Holder on the Hill today, he BETTER read the damn bill

before he tried to sue over it. I want him to sue but he admitted that he hasn't even read the bill yet :(

[marshall]

11. Like the rest of us, he's relying on the news to tell him what's going on

Somebody get the man a laptop!

[MIprogressive1]

12. He should not be relying on the media to give him his info.

He is the AG for the United States, he should have read the bill before talking about it at all on the tube. Ive read the bill and agree they should file suit, but at least read it first.

[marshall]

13. Why can't you be the AG?

We need more folks in DC who actually read stuff before they start talking about and signing it.