Thread: Arizona religious leaders to lobby McCain on immigration ref

Arizona religious leaders to lobby McCain on immigration reform

A number of Arizona religious leaders plan to fly to Washington on Thursday to ask home state Sen. John McCain and White House officials to take immediate action on comprehensive immigration reform.
The religious leaders have denounced Arizona SB-1070, the state's new and controversial law that requires local police to check the immigration status of anyone they reasonably suspect of being in the United States illegally. Critics say the new law legalizes racial profiling.
Nearly 60 percent of Americans support the new law, according to a new study by the Pew Research Center for the People & the Press. But a number of religious groups have joined calls for an Arizona boycott.
"The National Hispanic Christian Leadership Conference, Hispanic National Association of Evangelicals, stands poised to engage and support lawful activities that pressures the State of Arizona to repeal the recently passed legislation that continues to polarize our communities, discriminates against American citizens, and facilitates a platform for racial profiling." NHCLC president Rev. Samuel Rodriquez (an On Faith panelist) said in a statement.
Religious leaders who plan to fly to Washington are: Bishop Gerald Frederick Kicanas, Tucson Diocese of the Roman Catholic Church; Bishop Minerva G. Carcaño, Desert Southwest Conference of The United Methodist Church; Rev. Monsignor Richard William O'Keeffe, Episcopal Vicar, Yuma - La Paz Vicariate Immaculate Conception Parish; Rev. Dr. Gary D. Kinnaman, Pastor at Large, Phoenix-area, and Chairman, AZ Governor's Council on Faith and Community Initiatives, 2008; Rev. Jan Olav Flaaten, Executive Director, Arizona Ecumenical Council; Rabbi John Andrew Linder, Temple Solel, Scottsdale; Joseph David Rubio, Lead Organizer for Arizona, Industrial Areas Foundation.


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latimes.com
Arizona religious leaders seek delay of immigration law, bring appeal to Washington
The group of seven makes an 'emergency' visit to Capitol Hill, says comprehensive reform is needed: 'Border security alone has its limits.'
By Clement Tan, Tribune Washington Bureau
May 14, 2010

Reporting from Washington

Framing the Arizona immigration situation as a "moral crisis," a group of seven Arizona religious leaders, including Catholic and Methodist bishops, descended Thursday on Capitol Hill in an "emergency" visit to lobby for comprehensive immigration reform.

"Our role here is to invite dialogue … on this complex issue with many dimensions," said Bishop Gerald Frederick Kicanas of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Tucson after a morning meeting with Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.). "The church believes there's a need for respect and dignity, and we speak up for people who have their dignity violated.

"We agree there's a criminal network that has developed and that needs to be addressed," Kicanas said. "But border security alone has its limits on what can be accomplished."

Kicanas spoke before moving on to meetings with officials from the White House and the Justice and Homeland Security departments. The group planned to ask Justice Department officials to, at the very least, try to delay the July implementation of the Arizona immigration law to give Congress more time to act on comprehensive changes. Atty. Gen. Eric H. Holder Jr. said Sunday that the department was considering a lawsuit to stall the law, among other options.

The law allows police to demand citizenship papers from suspected illegal immigrants and to detain them if they can't produce proof.

"We are here … not in political capacities but as religious leaders," Kicanas said, "to prod, encourage and advocate comprehensive immigration reform." Kicanas said in a memo to his parishioners last month that the Catholic Church should join lawsuits challenging the Arizona immigration legislation.

Kicanas said the leaders were focusing on McCain because they believe he "has been and continues to be an important voice." McCain, however, has dropped his longtime support for comprehensive immigration reform as he faces a strong Republican primary challenge from former Rep. J.D. Hayworth, who is attacking McCain's failed 2007 attempt to pass an immigration bill.

The leaders' visit came as polls were released showing the extent of American support for the Arizona law. In a Wall Street Journal/NBC poll released Thursday, 46% of respondents said they strongly supported the measure, and 24% were strongly opposed.

Ten percent of Americans polled called immigration the nation's most important problem in a Gallup survey released Wednesday. It was the highest percentage with that opinion that Gallup had recorded in more than two years.

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld ... 0020.story

Arizona leaders push Congress, Justice, White House on immigration
By Patricia Zapor - Catholic News Service
Thursday, 13 May 2010

A delegation of Arizona religious leaders made the rounds in Washington May 13, encouraging members of Congress to pass comprehensive immigration reform and discussing possible legal challenges to the state's new immigration law with staff at the Justice Department and the White House.

Bishop Gerald F. Kicanas of Tucson, Ariz., joins other faith leaders during a press conference on immigration reform outside the office of U.S. Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz.,on Capitol Hill in Washington May 13. CNS photo/Bob Roller

At a news conference outside the offices of Sen. John McCain, Tucson Bishop Gerald F. Kicanas and United Methodist Bishop Minerva Carcano said their meeting with the Arizona Republican was cordial but that he was adamant about not wanting comprehensive immigration legislation to move in Congress until "the border is secure."

McCain previously co-sponsored legislation that dealt with border security packaged together with law changes that provide a way for undocumented immigrants to legalize their status and that would fundamentally change the system for legal immigration for family reunification and temporary work. As the Republican nominee for president in 2008, he advocated for legislation similar to that being encouraged by the religious delegation.

Bishop Kicanas told reporters that McCain said circumstances have changed and that he now believes enforcement has to happen separately and first.

McCain, who is facing a difficult primary election this summer, told the religious leaders he wants to beef up the number of Border Patrol officers and expand the wall along the border, they said.

Since 2000, the number of Border Patrol agents has more than doubled, from 8,600 to more than 21,000. Customs and Border Protection, Immigration and Customs Enforcement, the Drug Enforcement Administration and other agencies have an additional 23,000 people working along the border, collectively, according to the National Immigration Forum. Since 2006, hundreds of miles of fencing -- much of it 20-foot-high sections of sheet metal -- have been built on the Mexican border.

The two bishops and the clergy from other faiths who joined them in the visits said they support efforts to control illegal traffic across the border, especially that related to the illicit -- and often violent -- drug and weapons trade. But those efforts must be accompanied by efforts to deal with the estimated 12 million undocumented immigrants in the country and the backlogs of people who are waiting for visas to reunite their families or find work in the United States legally.

Bishop Kicanas said legislation should include "an earned pathway to citizenship, not amnesty but an earned path," as well as ways to keep families together by making it easier for people to bring their relatives into the country legally, because "the family is the nucleus of society and any breakdown of family life causes problems."

He said he and the others hope that Arizona's new law will be blocked from being enacted by any of several lawsuits filed and pending that challenge it. Among other provisions, the law requires police officers to arrest those they encounter in the course of work if they are not able to provide documentation of their legal status.

"We cannot have every state determining how federal immigration law is being enforced," Bishop Kicanas said.

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