Doocy advances false claim that VA county immigration law lowered crime rates

MoonHowler

Its about time someone in the media gets the story straight. 

Someone GETS it!  A big thanks to Media Mattersfor pointing out what Moonhowlings.net has been saying all along.

Copied in its entirety from mediamatters.org:

On Fox & Friends, co-host Steve Doocy and guest Corey Stewart, chairman of the Prince William County, Virginia, board of supervisors, falsely claimed that the county’s controversial immigration law reduced violent crime and has never been altered. In fact, Prince William County’s violent crime rates actually increased in 2009; the law was modified in 2008 to avoid legal challenges; and a University of Virginia study of the law shows that it has not led to a reduction in crime.

Doocy falsely claimed immigration law led to a “reduction in violent crimes” and an overall “huge drop in crime”

Doocy falsely claims immigration law led to “38 percent reduction in violent crimes.” On the June 21 edition of Fox News’ Fox & Friends, Doocy introduced Stewart by claiming, “Three years ago, Prince William County in Virginia passed major immigration reform, and they’ve since seen a huge drop in crime.” Doocy later said to Stewart, “Let’s take a look at some of the changes in Prince William County since this law went into place — 38 percent reduction in violent crimes.” The law in question requires police officers to inquire about the immigration status of those persons who have been placed under arrest.

In fact, Prince William County’s violent crime rate increased 10.9 percent in 2009. According to Prince William County Police Department crime statistics, in 2009, the county saw a 10.9 percent increase in violent crimes. The county’s “overall crime rate” decreased by 1.9 percent from the previous year. The law first went into effect in 2008, during which time the county saw an increase in its overall crime rate and a reduction in violent crimes versus the year prior.

Prince William County’s 2009 overall lowered crime rate is credited as being “part of a trend that started long before” the immigration bill. In a National Review Online post, John J. Miller wrote: “As it happens, crime rates have been going down for a long time in Prince William County. The latest numbers are part of a trend that started long before the county took a stand against illegal immigration.” Prince William County Police Chief Charlie T. Deane reportedly noted that crime rates have been decreasing nationwide and that Prince William County’s rates were consistent with that trend. According to The Washington Post, Deane said, ” ‘I also think, nationwide, crime rates are declining, and I’m pleased we’ve continued to see’ that in the county, too.”

“Illegal aliens” only account for a small percentage of crimes and arrests, and the vast majority of those arrested were for “misdemeanor or traffic charges.” The reports show that those suspected of being “illegal aliens” account for only a small percentage of total crimes. In 2008, “[o]f all persons arrested or summonsed in Prince William County, 1.7% were determined to lack legal status,” while “86.9% of those suspected to be illegal aliens were arrested on misdemeanor or traffic charges.” In 2009, “[o]f all persons arrested or summonsed in Prince William County, 2.2% were determined to lack legal status,” while “87.5% of those suspected to be illegal aliens were arrested on misdemeanor or traffic charges.”

UVA study: “[T]he policy has not reduced most forms of crime in PWC.” The University of Virginia (UVA) studied the effects of the law on Prince William County crime rates and concluded, “Overall, our descriptive assessment of PWCPD data on crime reports and arrests suggests that the policy has not reduced most forms of crime in PWC and that its contribution to the County’s drop in serious violence has likely been modest.” A May 7 Washington Post article cited the UVA study and reported that “the study also said that it seems unlikely that the county’s drop in violent crime was because of the policy, because illegal immigrants make up a small percentage of those arrested for such crimes.”

Doocy lets guest falsely claim that the “law stands today as it was written in 2007”

Doocy allows Stewart to falsely claim that the “law stands today as it was written in 2007.” After Doocy asked Stewart about legal challenges to the law, Stewart falsely claimed that “the federal district court in Arlington, Virginia, threw [a court challenge to the bill] out on its face — threw the challenge out on its face — and the law stands today as it was written in 2007.” 

In fact, the “ordinance was modified in 2008 amid charges that it was unconstitutional.” Contrary to Stewart’s claim that “the law stands today as it was written in 2007,” The Washington Post reported:

The Prince William ordinance was modified in 2008 amid charges that it was unconstitutional and could lead to racial profiling. In the end, rather than questioning only people they suspected of being undocumented immigrants, officers were directed to question all criminal suspects about their immigration status once an arrest was made.

— J.V.B

Are you as tired of reading and hearing about immigration as I am?

MoonHowler

Guest contributor George Harris gives us his unabashed opinion on the never-ending immigration debate. George never sugar coats things, nor is he soft on immigration.

[Disclaimer: guest opinions do not necessarily reflect the opinions of the blog administrators.]

Are you as tired of reading and hearing about immigration as I am? There is not an hour or a day that goes by without some talking head yammering on about illegal/undocumented immigrants. Newspapers, periodicals, television and radio bombard us with “news” about how we are being overrun by folks who have chosen to not follow the laws of this nation in order to be here legally. Congress is absolutely bumfuzzled about how to fix our “immigration problem.”

Depending on who you read or listen to, the illegal immigrant population is somewhere between 11 and 22 million. Pick whatever number between these two that you feel justifies your feelings about our present situation and you will be somewhere in the ballpark. Recommendations as to what to do about all these illegal immigrants range all the way from blanket amnesty for all of them with numerous paths to citizenship to ship all of them back “home.” While we are deciding on what to do with all the people already here, we want to put up a wall along the U.S.-Mexico border reminiscent of the Berlin Wall or the wall Israel is building to seal off the Palestinians. But many folks understand that you can’t build a wall high enough or long enough to keep people out if they are determined to come in. And it only seems to apply to our southern border. No one is talking about building a wall between the U.S. and Canada.

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Channel 4 News: Pol Wants ‘Zona-Style Illegal Immigration Law for Virginia

MoonHowler

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From NBC Washington:

The chairman of the Prince William County Board of Supervisors is proposing an Arizona-style illegal immigration law for the entire Commonwealth of Virginia.

The tough law on illegal immigration the county adopted a couple of years ago isn’t sufficient, according to a statement released by Corey Stewart for Chairman.

“We saw a 37 percent drop in violent crime in the first two years of enforcement and overall crime is at a 15-year low,” he said. “But we have anecdotally known, since day one, that the criminal aliens that fled were just going to neighboring jurisdictions.”

So Stewart has started a petition online and a Facebook page for The Virginia Rule of Law Campaign. He has promised a draft of the law soon

It would give police more power to identify and deport illegal immigrants, impose harsh penalties for illegal immigrants, and crack down on day labor and human smuggling. Jails would release illegal immigrants to Immigrations and Customs Enforcement upon completion of their sentences. Police would be allowed to make arrests without warrants if they believed those arrests could lead to deportations. And individual cities and counties would be barred from interfering.

Prince William County’s controversial law doesn’t make it a crime to be an illegal immigrant in the county, but it allows police to check immigration status of people who’ve been arrested, which Stewart credits for the drop in violent crime and fewer illegal immigrants in the county.

Those who campaigned for the law, which took effect in July 2008, argued that the county had to take care of itself if the commonwealth and country weren’t going to address illegal immigration. Stewart’s latest campaign takes the same position.

“As long as the federal government shows no interest in securing the border and no interest in internal enforcement to promote self-deportation, then states and localities will have to pick up the slack,” he said.

And he intends to use the 2011 election to pressure the General Assembly into passing his Virginia Rule of Law next session.

 

Corey’s Updated Website:

 The Virginia Rule of Law Act

  • Enhance Police Powers to Capture, Detain, and help Deport Criminal Aliens
    • Direct Virginia law enforcement officials to ascertain, in any lawful contact, the legal presence of an individual, when practicable.
    • Direct Virginia jails to release criminal aliens to Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) after serving their sentence.
    • Allow law enforcement officials to arrest illegals without warrant if they have reasonable suspicion that the arrest would make them removable from the United States.
  • Virginia Criminal Penalties for Illegal Aliens
    • Make it a violation of Virginia law to fail to complete alien registration documents.
    • Impose harsh penalties for terrorists and illegals caught with illegal drugs and deadly weapons.
  • Outlaw Sanctuary Policies
    • Prohibit cities and counties from preventing law enforcement officials from inquiring about legal presence or preventing them from sharing information with ICE.
  • Outlaw Illegal Day Laboring and Public Roadside Solicitation
    • Allow law enforcement officials to break up day laboring operations.
    • Prohibit solicitation along all public roads, crippling illegal day labor sites.
  • Crackdown on Human Smuggling
  • Prohibit smuggling and human trafficking, especially for sexual slavery.

    • The election is in 2011. Corey is attempting to ride the coattails of the  Arizona  anti-immigration law SB1070 (download the law) and capture some of the national attention that Arizona is getting over immigration.  It was announced late this afternoon that the Administration will sue  the State of Arizona over its law that is set to go into effect. July 28, 2010.  I suppose Corey Stewart is jealous of the impending lawsuit that will cost an already cash-strapped Arizona millions it can’t afford to spend.  Does Virginia need to get sued also?

    Corey needs to stop grand-standing and stop the continual embarrassment to Prince William County.   There needs to be no Virginia Rule of Law Act.  There are some extremely serious  violations embedded in that proposal that are  Constitutional violations that even a novice can spot.  No Rule of Law there.  If Stewart wants to be Mr. Rule of Law he needs to obey the law and stop trying to find ways to skirt around it just to get his name in the news.

    From the PWC Police Crime Report:

      RAPE STATISTICS

    RAPE STATISTICS 2005-2009
    Way to go, Corey. Last time I thought about it, rape was a violent crime.
    Down load Crime Reports:
    Crime Report 2008
    Crime Report 2009
     

    Research You Did Not Read in the N & M

    MoonHowler

    People may not like my politics but I do try to represent what goes onto this blog honestly. I think it is only fair to share this post from Debra Shutika’s blog with the contributors on our blog. It explains a great deal about the study that they did. Apparently, the News and Messenger also set the stage for some very bad press.  

    These women worked hard and deserve to have their point of view heard without the filter of those with not-so-hidden agendas.  If residents of the greater Manassas area  truly want to have their community problems solved, it makes sense, at least to me, to talk with people who at least will listen to you, such as these to researchers.  Please read the entire post before commenting:

    From Debra Shutika:

    To my readers:  

     

    Yesterday a local Virginia newspaper ran a story in response to a a press release regarding research that I and my colleague, Carol Cleaveland, had conducted in Manassas in 2008 and 2009. We are ethnographers, which means we utilize ethnography as our primary research method.  Ethnography is a research method often used in the social sciences, particularly anthropology, folklore and sociology, but also in a variety of other fields.  The goal of ethnography is to gather data that is in-depth and from a small group of people.  Usually this would be a local community, a neighborhood, or even a small town.  Data collection is done a number of ways: participant observation (where the researcher lives alongside his or her informants and documents day-to-day life and activities), but also interviews and questionnaires.  The purpose of an ethnographic account is to describe those who are studies (i.e., the people or ethnos) and to document this through writing, thus the term, ethnography. 

     

    We began our work in Manassas in the Weems neighborhood and Sumner Lakes in March 2008.  During that period, we interviewed 100 household that were randomly selected.  These households were non-immigrant households. The householder had to be able to speak English fluently to participate.  The summary of that research is highlighted this statement that I made earlier this year:

     

    “Our research suggests that the changes that have taken place in Manassas in the last 20 years have been unsettling for some residents,” says Debra Lattanzi Shutika, assistant professor of English at Mason. “Many of these residents seemed to be experiencing what I have identified as a type of ‘localized displacement’—they feel out of place in their home community. In some cases, residents told us that they found it difficult to adapt to the changes taking place around them, and that these changes that made their ‘home’ seem unfamiliar.”

    Throughout this phase of the research, we asked residents about a number of changes in their community. What we found is that Manassas had changed significantly over the last 20 years, and many residents viewed those changes as unsettling.  We also discovered that  a majority of the people we talked to had strong negative feelings about immigrants. We interviewed 103 households and then went back and did an additional 30 in-depth interviews.  These ranged from 1-3 hours in length, depending on the informant.

     

    In the second phase of this study, we went into two predominantly Latino neighborhoods and interviewed a non-random sample of residents. There we interviewed 60 people.  These residents reported feeling alienated from the community, and in some cases, extreme fear.  What I told Ms. Chumley when I spoke to her on Monday was, although it was not surprising that an undocumented person would feel frightened by the law, we were not expecting DOCUMENTED LATINOS, of which there are many in the area, to feel this way.  In fact, the responses of the documented indicated that they were just as likely to fear leaving their homes or sending their children out to play as others.  [Note: for reasons of confidentiality, we did not directly ask people about their documentation status.  However, those who were documented were forthcoming about their residency status.]

     

    When I read Ms. Chumley’s article, I was disappointed with her report because she clearly misrepresented our work.  For instance, both Prof. Cleaveland and I told her that we understood the frustrations of Manassas residents who were distressed with changes in their neighborhoods, such as having neighbors who did not cut their grass, had too many cars parked around their homes, and left trash unattended around their homes and on their laws.  For my part, most of the work that I have done in the last 15 years with immigration has focused equally on American-born residents in new destinations of Mexican migration.  I recently published an essay on this, which is linked here.

    In short, I may disagree with some of my informants about their perspectives on immigration, but that is not to say that I don’t think their perspectives should be ignored.  I honestly think that one of the major reasons why immigration has become such a volatile topic is because for too long residents complaints about the changes to their communities and the legitimate problems that come with a rapid increase in an immigrant population have been ignored by their local government. 

     Read More

    George Mason Study Brings out the Worst in County Chair and CXO

    MoonHowler

    A recent study on immigration from George Mason Univsity seems to have brought out the worst in our County Chair, Corey Stewart and newly appointed CXO, Melissa Peacor. Perhaps Ms. Peacor should be forgiven. She is a newly hired CXO who apparently came in under the auspices of Mr. Stewart. She hasn’t been around long enough to be an independent thinker. Even if she is, perhaps it is wiser to quote the party line. However, in the case of Corey Stewart, there is simply no pass. He is his usual bigoted, uninformed, blow-hard, name-calling, opportunistic self.

    From the News and Messenger:

    A new study from the George Mason University’s Project on Immigration finds many immigrants have lived in fear since the passage of Prince William’s 2007 resolution that requires police to check legal status of those who are arrested.

    The study was conducted by Debra Lattanzi Shutika, an English professor and folklorist, and Carol Cleaveland, a professional social worker. Lattanzi Shutika also said they were both “ethnographers,” which she defined as a research methodology that focuses on in-depth interviews with people.

    “We go into communities for long periods of time and talk in depth to people,” Lattanzi Shutika said, adding that the GMU study conducted interviews in two communities in Manassas called the Weems Neighborhood and Sumner Lakes. “In some cases, we had two-to-three hour interviews.”

    For the study, headlined on a press release from GMU as “Strict Immigration Law in Virginia County Adversely Affecting Well-Being of Latino Residents, New Survey Shows,” the two researchers interviewed residents of 60 Spanish-speaking households and 104 English-speaking households, Cleaveland said.

    The goal, according to Cleaveland, was to “understand the true experiences of Latino immigrants living in a certain area of Prince William County … [and] to understand what kind of experiences they were having since the resolution.”

    Those experiences, she continued, were that “people are afraid to leave the house, people feel that if they go to work they could be picked up or deported while their children are in school, and people have abandoned their homes because of this law.”
    Read More

    ‘Los Samaritanos’ leave food and water for illegal immigrants

    MoonHowler

    Another point of view from Arizona.  We have heard from those wanting to tighten up on illegal immigration and we have heard from those from PWC.

     

    From the Washington Post:

    At a time when state and federal governments are focused on tightening the border to keep out immigrants who cross illegally from Mexico, Wallin and her colleagues help people who make the trip. They leave water and food along well-known foot trails. They distribute maps showing the water sites and search for trekking migrants. Sometimes, they find dead bodies.

    Additionally,

    While the debate goes on, Wallin and a group of 140 volunteers who call themselves Los Samaritanos work against brutal heat and an unforgiving desert landscape where 61 migrants died in the seven months that ended April 30. In a region split by the increasingly fortified U.S.-Mexico border, they say they are doing moral deeds in the face of a simple reality: Migrants keep coming.

    “Most of the people we find are broken, beaten down, sobbing, so lonesome, broken. They just want to go home,” said the Rev. Randy Mayer, pastor of Good Shepherd United Church of Christ in Sahuarita, Ariz., home to Los Samaritanos. “We’re just trying to stop people from dying. Somebody will say, ‘What don’t you understand about “illegal”?’ Well, it’s more complicated than that.”

    U.S. Customs and Border Protection officials, who have caught 168,000 illegal immigrants since Oct. 1 in this section of southern Arizona near Tucson, disapprove of the effort

    In the end, people have to follow their own conscience and do what they think is right. Sometimes their attitudes stem from politics, religion, or altruism. The one thing that is certain: We don’t all agree. To some, Los Samaritanos are angels–to others, they are devils.

    .

    Corey Stewart, Tell the Truth!

    MoonHowler

     

    Once again, Chairman of the Board of Supervisors, Corey Stewart prevaricated and obfuscated.

    A few examples:

    1. He didn’t tell Alisyn how many times the Resolution changed from July 7, 2007 until May 1, 2008.

    2. He led the viewers to believe that the police could ask for documents based on probable cause. Does Corey still not know that probably cause no longer exists in our Resolution?

    3. He stated that violent crimes are down 38%. Not according to PWC crime statistics and he knows this.

    4. He was hung (sic) in effigy? I must have missed that one.

    5. He stated that 80% of the people of Prince William County support the law and that the UVA survey stated so. I would like to see that little known fact in writing. No such question existed on that survey.

    6. He assumed that fewer babies were born to illegal immigrant mothers and stated that as a fact when he had no verifiable proof. Immigration status is not collected at either hospital in the county and therefore he can only assume.

    7. We have fewer ESOL classes now? I don’t think so. The nuumber of students enrolled in ESOL dropped slightly at the height of the foreclosure crisis, but returned to an even greater number by FY2008-2009. 

    8. He failed to explain the evolution of what happened in PWC. He failed to explain that the Resolution that was passed on July 7, 2007 was not what passed around May 1, 2008. He led Alisyn to believe that whatever we did here fixed all immigration problems. That is simply not the case. He did not say that the status of all those arrested would be checked and he did not mention the 287(g) program. He failed to mention one of the worst housing crashes in the United States happened in PWC. He failed to mention he used  trumped up issues to get himself re-elected. He failed to mention what he did to the Chief of Police. He failed to mention what he did to his supervisor colleagues.

    How can he live with himself puffing up like that?  He  let everyone who was listening to Fox News at that hour believe he held the silver bullet.

    I felt very ashamed of my county and my state as I listed to something that simply was not the truth. Corey told how he wanted things to be, not how they really were. He misled the people of Arizona.

    Liar, Liar, Pants on fire!

    Police Department Illegal Immigration Policies

    President Obama Orders 1200 National Guard to Protect Border

    MoonHowler

    President Obama has ordered 1,200 National Guard to protect the border and has requested $500 Million from Congress to slow the flow of immigrants across the Mexican border.

    According to Politico:

    In addition to the troops, the funding will be used to increase Justice Department and Department of Homeland Security activities at the border with Mexico “to include increased agents, investigators, and prosecutors, as part of a multi-layered effort to target illicit networks trafficking in people, drugs, illegal weapons, and money,” an administration official said Tuesday.
    Senator John McCain who is in the battle of his life for his senate seat complained that 1,200 simply wasn’t enough boots on the ground.  McCain requested that 6,000 troops be deployed and sent to the area. 

    Barack Obama is going to send away her momma…

    MoonHowler

    Somehow the entire question seems to look different when it is attached to a darling little face.

    As the presidents addressed those in the rose garden, the 2 first ladies went to a nearby school to talk to school children.  One little girl asked the show-stoppers of all show-stoppers.  Hats off to Mrs. Obama for thinking fast on her feet.  And good for the little girl…she was NOT going to let the first lady off the hook. 


     

    The text, from the Huffington Post:

    While the two Presidents spoke about the need for immigration reformand about concerns over Arizona’s harsh new law — without saying anything new or different — down the road in Silver Spring, Maryland, First Lady Michele Obama and Mexico’s First Lady Margarita Zavala visited an elementary school to speak with a class of second graders. 

    ABC News’ Karen Travers reports what happened when a young girl spoke up:

    The student shyly raised her hand and said, “My mom … she says that Barack Obama is taking everybody away that doesn’t have papers.”Mrs. Obama replied: “Yeah, well that’s something that we have to work on, right? To make sure that people can be here with the right kind of papers, right? That’s exactly right.”

    The girl then said quietly, “But my mom doesn’t have any …” and trailed off.

    Mrs. Obama replied: “Well, we have to work on that. We have to fix that, and everybody’s got to work together in Congress to make sure that happens. That’s right.”

    “We are all Arizonans?”

    MoonHowler

     

    Sarah Palin being an Arizonan
    Sarah Palin being an Arizonan

    The AFL-CIO and one of its civil rights groups has written to DHS Secretary Janet Napolitano demanding that all agreements between Arizona law enforcement and DHS cease. AFL-CIO is the largest labor union in the United States. According to the Huffington Post:

    On Friday, the union conglomerate AFL-CIO and the civil rights coalition, The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights, became the latest institutions to urge for the isolation or boycott of Arizona when they requested that Homeland Security terminate its training of local law enforcement officials in the state.

    “We write to express our deep concern with the Department of Homeland Security’s continued cooperation with state and local law enforcement in Arizona pursuant to Section 287(g) of the Immigration and Nationality Act (‘the 287(g) program’) in the aftermath of Arizona’s passage of Senate Bill 1070, and we ask that you immediately rescind all 287(g) program agreements in Arizona,” the letter reads.

    The message continues:

    “We are grateful that President Obama has spoken out to correctly call the Arizona law ‘misguided.’ However, more than words are required from the federal government at this time. As we explain below, the enforcement of Arizona’s law fundamentally depends on the use of federal government resources for the implementation of its racial profiling regime. Unless DHS terminates all 287(g) program agreements in Arizona, the federal government will be complicit in the racial profiling that lies at the heart of the Arizona law. Such a result would place the DHS at odds with this Administration’s stated views on SBI070, and at odds with basic American values of tolerance and non-discrimination.”

    The letter is by far the most serious effort to date to make Arizona’s new immigration law untenable for the state. Other groups have urged economic and travel boycotts as a way to target the state government’s tourism revenues. Should DHS adopt the AFL-CIO’s suggestion (and it’s a big question whether the Department will) it would deny the state the type of law enforcement expertise that the immigration law was designed to beef up in the first place.

    The legislation passed by Arizona state government would make the failure to carry immigration documents a crime. It would also give law enforcement officials fairly broad powers to detain those suspected of being in the country illegally.

    “A review of DHS’s 287(g) program agreements in Arizona makes clear that once SB1070 becomes effective, DHS will be complicit in the enforcement of Arizona’s misguided law,” reads the letter, signed by AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka and Wade Henderson, President and CEO of The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights. “We urgently request that you exercise your authority to immediately rescind all 287(g) program agreements in Arizona and, in this manner, avoid making the federal government complicit in the enforcement of Arizona’s misguided law.”

    So what, you might say. PWC and City of Manassas both participate in the 287(g) program. What impact will the dust up in Arizona have on our MOU with Homeland Security?

    Meanwhile things show no signs of calming down in Arizona. 9500Liberty is now being shown in Tucson per request of the community. Sarah Palin is out there saying ‘We are all Arizonans now.’ Is that sort of like being a Hokie for the day?

    Quoting Huffington Post again:

    Jan Brewer and Palin blamed President Barack Obama for the state law, saying the measure is Arizona’s attempt to enforce immigration laws because the federal government won’t do it.

    “It’s time for Americans across this great country to stand up and say, ‘We’re all Arizonans now,'” Palin said. “And in clear unison we say, ‘Mr. President: Do your job. Secure our border.'”

    The former Alaska governor appeared with Brewer at a brief news conference on Saturday. The event launched a website that Brewer said was an effort to educate America about border security and discourage an economic boycott of the state.

    I hate being simple minded but did Mexicans just start coming across the border since President Obama took office? I could have sworn this was an issue before then. Silly me.

    To read the full SB1070 click the blue.

    Radio Interview with Greg and Caller Elena 5/8/10

    MoonHowler

    Greg Letiecq interviews with ‘Sarge’ on the Jeff Fargas Show. Sarge is out in Arizona.

    The show takes callers and Elena calls to throw in the other side of the story.

    The podcast will appear. It takes about a minute. You will want to chose the May 8 if it isn’t chosen for you.

    Sorry folks, it isn’t pretty but I got it here…sort of.

    CLICK HERE FOR THE SHORT VERSION

    Timely and Chilling: PWC from an AZ Perspective

    MoonHowler

    At least some folks will be well-known out in AZ. Bill Goodykoontz of the Arizona Central tells a story he describes as chilling and provocative. Funny the names that pop out at us from the Grand Canyon State. Meanwhile,  theaters in Tempe continue to be sold out.

    In 2007, Prince William County in Virginia enacted a policy requiring police officers to question anyone they had probable cause to believe was in the country illegally

    That has a familiar ring to it.

    Read More

    Arizona Follows PWC’s Path, or Does It?

    MoonHowler

     

    From insidenova.com:

    What’s happening in Arizona is exactly what happened in Prince William, but board Chairman Corey Stewart says outcry and criticism shouldn’t dissuade the state from going forth with tough new immigration laws.

    “Essentially, we were the test case for what’s going on in Arizona,” said Stewart, R-At-Large. “I can tell you the intensity they’re facing is exactly the intensity the board of county supervisors faced, and it came from several corridors … that essentially tried to threaten the county.”

    In late April, Arizona’s Republican governor, Jan Brewer, signed into law new immigration policy giving local law enforcement the authority “to reasonably determine the immigration status of a person involved in a lawful contact [with officials],” according to the summary sheet of S.B. 1070 posted on the state’s website. The lawful contact clause in particular caused concern among civil rights activists who foresaw worst-case scenarios where police would engage in racial profiling and de-mand paperwork proving legal status from, say, pedestrians based on skin color.

    Prince William County’s immigration policy, by contrast, states that police broach the issue of legal presence only after “physical custodial arrest,” according to a June 2008 press release from the police department on the main points of enforcement procedures.[bold mine]

    Read More