News Update - October 1, 2011

Alabama Restrictive Immigration Law Upheld by Federal District Court Judge; U.S. to Appeal.

On September 28, 2011, Judge Sharon Blackburn of the Federal District Court in Birmingham in two decisions over 100 pages each, Hispanic Interest Coalition of Alabama v. Bentley and U.S. v. Alabama upheld many sections of Alabama's restrictive immigration law, HB 56.  Law-enforcement authorities are now empowered to check on a driver's  immigration status during routine traffic stops or arrests if reasonable suspicion exists that the person is in the United States illegally; elementary and secondary schools are required to determine the immigration status of their students; she held that Alabama's criminalizing the willful failure of an undocumented alien to carry federal immigration papers did not preempt federal law; and that it is legal for the state to nullify any contracts entered into by illegal immigrants as well as transactions between any division of the state and an illegal immigrant.  Judge Blackburn did enjoin enforcement of some other sections of HB56 as being pre-empted by federal law such as its prohibitions against the harboring of undocumented immigrants, prohibiting undocumented aliens from attending or enrolling in Alabama public post-secondary educational institutions, and prohibiting undocumented immigrants from applying, soliciting, or performing work as employees or independent contractors.

Two days later on September 30, 2011, the U.S. government filed court documents that it plans to appeal the ruling.  This of course means that much time and expense will be spent by the state of Alabama in opposing the appeal, not to mention the vast economic damage that the ruling will cause the state in terms of lost state, property and sales taxes, economic activity, and gross state product.  The message will also not be lost on international corporations that their employees of color may experience state-sanctioned harassment in Alabama. 



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 © 2011 Alan Lee, Esq.

 

Copyright © 2003-2012 Alan Lee, Esq.
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