Thread: Hearing begins on request for injunction against Alabama imm

Hearing begins on request for injunction against Alabama immigration law
By The Birmingham News
Wednesday, August 24, 2011, 9:00 AM

BIRMINGHAM, Alabama -- The U.S. Department of Justice, leaders from three large Alabama churches and a host of interest groups and individual plaintiffs are at a hearing before Chief U.S. District Judge Sharon Lovelace Blackburn on whether she should grant a preliminary injunction to temporarily halt enforcement of Alabama's new immigration law while a court challenge is resolved.

Blackburn has consolidated three federal lawsuits -- from the U.S. Justice Department, bishops from three denominations, and several immigrant groups and individuals. All three suits seek to void part or all of Alabama's new immigration law.

Alabama Attorney General Luther Strange is expected to lead a team of state lawyers during the hearing that was to begin at 9 a.m. in a Birmingham federal courtroom. The Attorney General's Office declined to comment on the hearing, saying its positions are laid out in the court record. However, state officials sued in the lawsuit have said the new law in many respects just repeats what's already in federal law.

Those who oppose the new law say it tries to usurp federal authority and discourage illegal immigrants from sending their children to schools, and to make it difficult to live and work in the state.


Vigil in front of the Hugo L. Black U.S. Courthouse in Birmingham on Aug. 23 on the eve of a federal court hearing on Alabama's immigration law.

http://blog.al.com/spotnews/2011/08/hea ... t_for.html

Contentious Ala. immigration law goes before judge
By BOB JOHNSON
Associated Press
Posted: 08/24/2011 06:46:37 AM PDT

MONTGOMERY, Ala.—A federal judge in Birmingham is poised to hear arguments from the Obama administration and others Wednesday over whether a new Alabama immigration law constitutes an unfair assault on civil liberties or is a long-overdue effort to protect American jobs and borders.

U.S. District Judge Sharon Blackburn scheduled a hearing starting at 9 a.m. Wednesday on motions seeking to temporarily block a new state law that's been described by supporters and opponents as the toughest crackdown on illegal immigration in the country. Attorneys said they don't know when Blackburn will rule, but pointed out that she doesn't have much time because the immigration law is set to take effect Sept. 1.

The measure allows police officers, in conducting routine traffic stops, to arrest those they suspect of being illegal immigrants. The law's broad provisions also make it a crime to transport or provide shelter to an illegal immigrant. It also requires schools to report the immigration status of students, a provision opponents say will make many parents afraid to send their children to school.

The lawsuits challenging the law—filed by the Obama administration, a coalition of civil rights groups and church leaders—have all been consolidated before the chief federal judge from Alabama's northern district.

The challenges in Alabama are being closed watched nationwide. At issue is just how far Alabama can go in controlling illegal immigration.

Injunctions have been issued against all or parts of similar immigration laws in Arizona, Georgia, Indiana and Utah. Impacts are potentially wide-reaching as some Alabama farmers fret they won't find affordable workers to harvest crops and school officials worry over whether the children of illegal immigrants will be denied an education. One provision, critics say, may even create long lines at courthouses by requiring vehicle owners to show proof of citizenship when they buy tags.

The Obama administration argues in its lawsuit that enforcing immigration laws is the job of the federal government, not the states. Another challenge was filed by a coalition of civil rights groups including the Montgomery-based Southern Poverty Law Center and the American Civil Liberties Union. A third lawsuit was filed by bishops of the Catholic, United Methodist and Episcopal churches in Alabama and claims the law makes it a crime for Christians to follow the Biblical instructions to be "Good Samaritans" and help one another.

But lawmakers who passed the law argued it was necessary because the federal government had been lax in enforcing immigration laws.

An attorney for the bishops, Augusta Dowd of Birmingham, said she expects the hearing will continue into Wednesday afternoon. She said she doesn't know when a ruling will be issued by Blackburn, a former federal prosecutor who became a federal judge in 1991 after being nominated by George H.W. Bush.

"I know she's very cognizant of the Sept. 1 date," Dowd said.

Sam Brooke, an attorney for the Southern Poverty Law Center, said the civil rights groups will be asking that "the entire law" be tossed out even as their attorneys object to specific provisions of the law.

"This law is unconstitutional in many ways," Brooke added.

Brooklyn Roberts, an attorney and executive director of the Eagle Forum of Alabama, which supports the new law, said she expects some of the major provisions to be upheld in court—including a provision that requires employers to use a federal system called E-Verify to determine if new workers are in the country legally.

The group pushed for years for such a law, complaining that illegal aliens constitute a security risk and a drain on state resources.

"It took a couple of years, but we finally got something through," Roberts said, adding "we can't continue to let people flood over the border unchecked."

Supporters in the Legislature said the law would protect Alabama jobs and even those immigrants in the country legally.

The bill's sponsor, Republican Rep. Micky Hammon, has said it would ease unemployment by opening up jobs currently held by illegal immigrants. More than 200,000 people in Alabama were unemployed in May, according to the latest statistics available.

The Pew Hispanic Center estimates there are about 120,000 illegal immigrants in the state, many believed to be working at farms, chicken processing plants and in construction.

Some Alabama farmers fret, however, that the law will make it difficult to raise a work force at planting and harvesting time.

Tom Bentley, a 65-year-old retired peach farmer, said he stopped farming on most of his property years ago because of the headaches of ensuring his work force was legal. He said he obtained his workers through a federal program that provides documented workers for nine months out of the year, but keeping up with the myriad rules and red tape was time-consuming and expensive.

He warned workers would go pick crops elsewhere in the U.S. without such laws, leaving farmers the trouble of finding local workers willing to work long days picking peaches in the withering summer heat in Alabama. Most say that's a job mainly immigrants are willing to do.

"These folks that are in jail or on welfare aren't going to pick peaches," Bentley said.

http://www.marinij.com/tablehome/ci_18746510

BIRMINGHAM, Alabama -- The U.S. Department of Justice, leaders from three large Alabama churches and a host of interest groups and individual plaintiffs are at a hearing before Chief U.S. District Judge Sharon Lovelace Blackburn on whether she should grant a preliminary injunction to temporarily halt enforcement of Alabama's new immigration law while a court challenge is resolved.

Why isn't the DOJ holding "hearings" on how it is that obama can usurp established immigration law by essentially halting deportations of million of those in this country illegally. Why aren’t there any hearings on how it is that obama can create an exempted class of illegal invaders from deportation, (by executive memo) when established law makes no such distinction and Congress did not ratify? Where are those hearings?

We were taught that a distinguishing component to American government was the "checks and balances,â€

RELATED

Ala. Businesses Riled By State's New Immigration Law
http://www.alipac.us/ftopicp-1259337.html#1259337

You know Alabama is one of the several states that has MOST OF ITS POPULATION ON FOOD STAMPS!

Federal lawyer: no room for Ala. immigration law
BOB JOHNSON
Associated Press

BIRMINGHAM, Ala. — An attorney for the U.S. Justice Department says it's the federal government's obligation to regulate immigration and there is "no room" for states to adopt their own laws cracking down on illegal immigration.

Deputy Assistant U.S. Attorney General William Orrick told a judge in Birmingham on Wednesday that sections of Alabama's new immigration law should be blocked because they conflict with federal law. Orrick said the law makes criminals out of people who rent houses to illegal immigrants and in some cases makes it a crime to work.

U.S. District Judge Sharon Blackburn is holding a hearing on lawsuits by the Obama administration and others to block the law. She will also hear arguments from attorneys for the state asking her to let the law take effect on Sept. 1.

http://ap.onlineathens.com/pstories/us/ ... 2141.shtml

Justice Department, ACLU challenge Alabama's immigration law in federal court; say state is treading on U.S. government
Published: Wednesday, August 24, 2011, 11:32 AM
Updated: Wednesday, August 24, 2011, 11:50 AM
By Brian Lawson,
The Huntsville Times

BIRMINGHAM, Alabama - In federal court in Birmingham this morning, attorneys for the U.S. Department of Justice and the American Civil Liberties Union challenged numerous aspects Alabama's sweeping immigration reform, as they seek to block most provisions from taking effect on Sept. 1.

William Orrick, attorney for the Justice Department, argued that the state is entering a field already occupied by federal government. And Alabama's law, he said, would harm the federal government's ability to conduct foreign relations, as well as disrupt national security prioities regarding immigration enforcement.

Orrick also said that provisions of the state law related to daily life, such as housing and education, are aimed at driving people out of Alabama. "A state may not make it impossible for someone to live in this country," said Orrick.

Cecilia Wang, attorney for ACLU, went next. She spoke about issues related to Fourth Amendment and law enforcement. She gave examples of someone who came to the United States illegally but has been approved for adjustment of immigration status and does not yet have papers. Under state law such a person could face criminal charges in Alabama even though his or her federal staus is in the process of changing.

U.S. Dsitrict Judge Sharon Lovelace Blackburn said the language wasn't clear in some sections of the 72-page act, such as those related to police stops and detention of people suspected of being in the country illegally. She said the state could have spent a few more years working on the language on this section.

She also questioned the idea that the state could use birth certificates to determine the citizenship status of parents of schoolchildren.

The hearing, held in a packed courtroom with overflow seating, was to reconvene at 11:25 a.m.

http://blog.al.com/breaking/2011/08/jus ... lu_ch.html

Obama administration seeks stay of Alabama immigration law
Verna Gates
Reuters
4:28 p.m. CDT, August 24, 2011

BIRMINGHAM, Ala (Reuters) - Lawyers for the Obama administration and other groups asked a federal judge on Wednesday to temporarily block Alabama's immigration law, widely seen as the toughest state measure on illegal immigration in the country.

The law, set to take effect on September 1, requires police to detain people they suspect of being in the United States illegally if a person cannot produce proper documentation when stopped for any reason.

The law will also make it a crime to knowingly transport or harbor an illegal immigrant, and requires public schools to determine, by reviewing birth certificates or sworn affidavits, the legal residency status of students upon enrollment.

The administration argues that the U.S. Constitution bars states from adopting their own immigration regime that interferes with the federal system. There are an estimated 11 million illegal immigrants in the United States.

"It is important that the country speak with one voice and that voice belongs to the executive branch and the Department of Homeland Security," said William Orrick, Deputy Assistant U.S. Attorney General.

Besides Alabama, Georgia, Utah and Indiana are also defending new immigration laws in federal court. The Obama administration successfully sued to block Arizona's tough law last year and courts have also put the laws in Georgia, Indiana and Utah on hold.

Cecillia Wang, director of the ACLU Immigrants' Rights Project, said the laws grant state and local authorities wide reaching rights to "find, detain, punish and expel" people suspected of being illegal immigrants.

PACKED COURTROOM

Conservatives have complained the Obama administration has failed to sufficiently stop the flow of illegal immigrants into the country. Attempts to overhaul federal immigration policy have gone nowhere in the U.S. Congress.

Bill sponsor, Alabama State Senator Scott Beason, a Republican, said the federal government declined to help the state with its burgeoning illegal immigrant population, forcing action.

"We asked for help but the federal government is not doing anything about it. They are not following what their laws say," he said.

More than 200 people packed the courtroom and overflow room of the downtown courthouse for Wednesday's hearing, many of them young people wearing high school graduation robes to protest a ban on seeking financial aid for higher education.

"This law is wrong. It takes my dream of becoming a physician or a nurse and throws the dream away," said Jose Perez, 15, a sophomore at Pelham High School who came to Alabama 13 years ago and is undocumented.

But in court, Chief Justice of the Northern District of Alabama Sharon Blackburn said education was not a civil right.

The group of 30 students calling themselves the Dreamers for the Future hope for laws allowing undocumented students access to in-state tuition and financial aid, or an amnesty similar to that signed into law by Ronald Reagan in 1986.

Groups such as the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) and bishops representing Methodist, Episcopal and Catholic denominations have filed civil rights suits against the laws.

Under the Alabama law, businesses must also use a database called E-Verify to confirm the immigration status of new employees and could face penalties for knowingly employing someone without legal resident status.

Alabama will defend the laws in the afternoon session.

(Editing by Colleen Jenkins and Cynthia Johnston)

This story corrects the name and title of the ACLU official

http://www.whnt.com/sns-rt-us-alabamatr ... 9417.story

Federal judge expresses doubt that Alabama's immigration law would criminalize church activities
By Brian Lawson,
The Huntsville Times
Wednesday, August 24, 2011, 3:53 PM
Updated: Wednesday, August 24, 2011, 5:06 PM

BIRMINGHAM, Alabama -- During the most pointed exchange of today's hearing so far, U.S. District Judge Sharon Lovelace Blackburn this afternoon consistently and repeatedly expressed doubt that the state's new immigration law would harm church leaders.

Blackburn told the attorney for three bishops of three different denominations that she didn't think contract prohibitions would block church activities and did not see any restrictions of freedom of assembly contained in the law that were likely to affect church ministries.

Leaders of the Episcopal, Methodist and Roman Catholic churches in Alabama had filed a federal lawsuit to stop enforcement of the state's new immigration law, most sections of which take effect on Sept. 1.

The law bars knowingly providing transportation or harboring an illegal immigrant, or encouraging an illegal immigrant to remain in Alabama. The law, if enforced, will place Alabama church members in the "untenable position of verifying individuals' immigration documentation" before being able to provide things such as food clothing, shelter and transportation to those in need, according to the lawsuit.

"The bishops saying it is so and believing it, doesn't make it so," said Blackburn on Wednesday, while questioning attorneys for the religious leaders.

Earlier in the day, Blackburn heard arguments over other aspects of the 72-page act from attorneys for U.S. Department of Justice, the ACLU and the Southern Poverty Law Center.

Attorneys for the state of Alabama will continue their arguments at 4 p.m.

http://blog.al.com/breaking/2011/08/fed ... oubts.html

BIRMINGHAM, Ala. — An attorney for the U.S. Justice Department says it's the federal government's obligation to regulate immigration and there is "no room" for states to adopt their own laws cracking down on illegal immigration

These people are like a broken record. Even when the Feds do their jobs (as in the Secure Community or 287g Program)these nitwits still protest the laws. So it has nothing to do with who is making the law against illegals it is the fact they do not want laws to be made at all.