News Update - August 3, 2010

By Alan Lee, Esq.

Obama Re-Energizing Political Base In Suing Arizona Over SB 1070

In a masterful political move, President Obama is re-energizing his political base of Latinos and other ethnic groups in America through his administration's suit against the State of Arizona's law making it a crime to be illegal in the state, SB 1070.  On June 28, 2010, Federal District Judge Susan Bolton granted the administration's motion for an injunction against implementation of the law acknowledging that the federal government has primary authority over immigration affairs and that states cannot impede federal priorities or enforcement. 

The judge blocked significant parts of Arizona’s new immigration law, “SB1070”, that were poised to be implemented on July 29, 2010.  These included requiring immigrants to prove that they were authorized to be in the country, police officers checking the immigration status of people stopped on traffic violations if they are suspected to be in the U.S. illegally, detaining individuals until their legal status was clarified, and banning illegal immigrants from working in Arizona.   

Although the Arizona Governor, Jan Brewer, immediately appealed the injunction, President Obama's move is re-energizing his base in time for the November midterm elections as his base sees the effectiveness of the Administration's suit, the conservative and Tea Party opposition even more clearly, and the overwhelming danger of being absent from the polls in November.  Many political pundits expect the case to be resolved before the Supreme Court, but the view from this corner is that, given the long history of federal supremacy over states, especially in the area of immigration, the Administration will prevail.


The author is a 30+ year practitioner of immigration law based in New York City. He was awarded the Sidney A. Levine prize for best legal writing at the Cleveland-Marshall College of Law in 1977 and has written extensively on immigration over the past years for the ethnic newspapers, World Journal, Sing Tao, Pakistan Calling, Muhasha and OCS. He has testified as an expert on immigration in civil court proceedings and was recognized by the Taiwan government in 1985 for his work protecting human rights. His article, "The Bush Temporary Worker Proposal and Comparative Pending Legislation: an Analysis" was Interpreter Releases' cover display article at the American Immigration Lawyers Association annual conference in 2004, and his victory in the Second Circuit Court of Appeals in a case of first impression nationwide, Firstland International v. INS, successfully challenged INS' policy of over 40 years of revoking approved immigrant visa petitions under a nebulous standard of proof. Its value as precedent, however, was short-lived as it was specifically targeted by the Administration in the Intelligence Reform Act of 2004.

This article © 2010 Alan Lee, Esq.

 

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