Local Police Stepping Up Involvement in Immigration Mattters
The AP reports that local police in many states increasingly are becoming involved in enforcement of immigration laws, an area traditionally left to the feds.
Frustrated by illegal immigrant criminals who slip their grasp, a growing number of state and county police agencies nationwide are moving to join a federal program that enlists local officers to enforce immigration laws. The federal government has already granted that authority in Florida and Alabama, and the program is under consideration in Connecticut, Oklahoma and Arkansas.
It's also in the works in Southern California - one of the nation's most ethnically diverse regions - where it would reverse a long-standing local police policy of avoiding questions about immigration status during criminal investigations.
This is bad policy.
Immigrant rights groups insist the move will discourage people from reporting domestic violence or other crimes for fear of deportation, and that it would lead to racial profiling and other abuses. "We're 100 percent against it," said Amin David, president of Los Amigos of Orange County. "It will have a chilling effect on our community."
There's a lot more reasons this is a lousy idea, as I set out here back in 2003 when some Republican congresspersons introduced the CLEAR Act (H.R. 2671.)
It will result in
- increased racial profiling
- reduced reporting of crime for fear of being asked questions that could lead to deportation
- reduced protection for victims of domestic violence.
The ACLU has more.
These combined measures will ensure that more immigrants will avoid contact with local law enforcement, putting entire communities at risk. For instance, immigrant victims of crime will hesitate to report the crimes to the police if they fear adverse immigration consequences from their contact with the officials. Even now, criminals often target immigrants for victimization because they know immigrants are reluctant to report the crimes. Meanwhile, the perpetrators go undetected and continue their criminal activities. Moreover, under these proposed CLEAR Act provisions, immigrants who could offer useful information to security investigators will be even less inclined to come forward, for fear of personal immigration consequences. In other words, the CLEAR Act ignores the benefits of community policing in favor of a "police state" for immigrants, a shift that will jeopardize the safety of us all.
The CLEAR Act also changes the priorities of law enforcement agencies throughout the government. It undermines public safety at the local level by shifting the focus of law enforcement officials away from fighting crime and towards enforcing federal immigration law. At the national level, the Act forces the federal immigration system to treat all immigration law violators as if they had committed criminal offenses. With millions of immigrants in the United States but likely only a handful of terrorists, it doesn't make sense for law enforcement efforts to be diverted and diffused in this way.
...Undoubtedly, one of the great challenges we face as a nation in the post September 11 era is achieving a balance between security and liberty. The CLEAR Act does not help us achieve that balance. It is the latest in a series of measures directed against immigrants by anti-immigration forces who are exploiting the tragedy of September 11 to advance their own agenda. Their actions dishonor the memory of the many immigrants, as well as U.S. citizens, who perished in those attacks.
The Clear Act has not passed Congress. Proponents tried to attach it to other bills, but that failed. Keep an eye out for any return. Here's an action page to learn more.
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