Arizona's Immigration Law Is Constitutional--and Already Working

Twenty GOP Senators, including Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell and Judiciary Committee Ranking Member Chuck Grassley, have sent a letter to Pres. Barack Obama looking for answers to several pressing questions regarding the administration's new plan to offer an Executive Amensty to certain illegal aliens.

The Senators wrote:

"We are extremely concerned by your announcement last week that the Department of Homeland Security plans to implement a program that grants deferred action to an untold number of illegal immigrants ... Not only do we question your legal authority to act unilaterally in this regard, we are frustrated that you have intentionally bypassed Congress and the American people."

As President, you swore to uphold and defend the Constitution and enforce the laws. Your recently announced directive runs contrary to that responsibility.

‎"We are also concerned that the directive being implemented allows individuals under the age of 30 to obtain a work authorization. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the unemployment rate for young adults aged 16-24 has been nearly 17% for the last year.

According to a Gallup poll conducted in April of this year, 32% of 18 to 29 year-olds in the U.S. workforce were underemployed.

Your directive runs contrary to the premist that American workers must come before foreign nationals. It is astonishing that your administration would grand work authorizations to illegal immigrants during this time of record unemployment."

American of CA 3:42PM June 20, 2012

Mr. Pearce,

You’re kidding right? Many of the facts you claim in the article are skewed or there just plain lies.

First, your say “Phoenix ranked second in the world in kidnappings.” This is a flat out lie, and it only took me 3 minutes to find the truth. Below are lines from an article that was published by the Huffington Post and verified by Politifact. The title of the article read: “McCain Falsely Claims Phoenix Is 'Number-Two Kidnapping Capital of The World'

“Mexico City, Caracas, Venezuela, and Tegucigalpa, Honduras are the top three cities in terms of kidnappings.” And… “Mexico by far has been the biggest location for kidnappings" followed by Honduras, Venezuela, Nigeria and the Philippines.” Neither Phoenix nor the US was in the top 10.

“Signs were posted just 30 miles from Phoenix by the Feds warning citizens they were entering into territory controlled by cartels and gangs.” I’ve traveled in the Phoenix area many time while living there and never once saw such a sign.

You mentioned that AZ was ranked 49 during the recession and is the “6th best performing during the recovery.” You seem to be comparing apples and oranges. Do us all a favor don’t be vague. What year and month was AZ’s economy ranked 49th (next to last!) in the nation, and what year and month did it become ranked all the way to the 6th best state economy in the US. You wouldn’t write it this way because you know everyone would see thru that lie. No state economy has ever moved that far that fast. To make matters worse, you imply that this miraculous economic growth was the result of the passing of SB-1070 – what a joke! Everyone is not as dumb as you seem to think.

“Among the many safeguards written into SB 1070 are stringent protections against racial profiling.” I think this is the biggest joke of them all. Anyone with half a brain knows that there is no way to police what is a man’s (or woman’s) heart. If I’m a cop with reasonable intelligence and I want to profile a particular group, I can easily do it under the guise of the law. They were doing it under the guise of the law in Los Angeles for years and years. It was only when America saw the Rodney King beating that white folks started to believe it “may” be happening.

“And all of this without a single civil rights, racial profiling, or biased policing complaint." Wow!!! Here’s another pretty big lie, and one that has been the easiest of all to debunk. There have been many profiling cases in AZ since SB-1070. Too many to mention, but all you have to do is visit the ACLU’s website and search AZ profiling cases. You will see what I mean.

This article is full of lies and half-truths. Mr. Pearce, do you carry your birth certificate in your wallet? Would you be angry if you 18 year old son was taken to jail and held there because he was walking down the street with no ID in his pocket? Mexicans lived in what is not AZ long before you or any of your ancestors did. You are a hypocrrite!

Wisdom of LA 11:48AM April 30, 2012

My favorite part of this article was the lack of citations for the many statistics. They just get in the way!

Billy Bob Bill Bob of AZ 9:21PM April 23, 2012

Illegals are illegal.

Andy of GA 7:58AM April 23, 2012