Friday, July 16, 2010, 4:29pm MST
Fund-raising effort launched by Arpaio to keep 2011 MLB All-Star game in Phoenix
Phoenix Business Journal - by Mike Sunnucks

Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio is linking conservative fund-raising efforts to keeping Major League Baseball’s 2011 All-Star Game in Phoenix.

Critics of the state’s new illegal immigration law are lobbying MLB Commissioner Bud Selig to yank the game out of Chase Field. Selig has said he does not intend to do so.

Phoenix and the Arizona Diamondbacks have never hosted the MLB All-Star game before, but it could mean millions of dollars in economic impact to metro Phoenix. The July 12 game played in Anaheim, Calif., brought in about $85 million in spending to that area.

The National Council of La Raza and others opposed to the illegal immigration law say the measure is anti-Hispanic, and the group is pressuring MLB to move the game.

Arpaio is sending out e-mails and fund-raising pitches asking those who support the law to sign a petition in favor of keeping the game in Arizona. He wants backers to donate money to a Tempe-group called Ban Amnesty Now.

Ban Amnesty Now is under another Tempe entity called the Conservative Leadership Coalition, which is headed by Sean McCaffrey, according to the Arizona Corporation Commission. The ACC shows the coalition was established in May, after Gov. Jan Brewer signed Senate Bill 1070 into law.

McCaffrey is a former director of the Arizona Republican Party.

McCaffrey and Arpaio said in a statement released July 9, that they want to collect at least 50,000 petition signatures from those opposed to moving the MLB All-Star game.

“A vast majority of Americans support SB 1070, just as a vast majority of Americans love baseball,â€