Thread: Still Going After Illegals; Immigration and the Law

Still going after Illegals; Immigration and the law

The Economist
October 24, 2009

Phoenix - America's toughest sheriff is still hunting illegals

JOE ARPAIO, the elected sheriff of Maricopa County in Arizona, revels in controversy. "I use my inmates as Hollywood," he practically shouts, as he explains why he makes prisoners wear pink underwear, parades them through downtown Phoenix in chain gangs and houses them in army tents left over from the Korean war.

"I want everybody to know it's 130 degrees in those tents," he booms. He thinks people ought to be ready for "America's toughest sheriff" before even thinking about coming to Maricopa without papers.

In Arizona, most illegal immigrants are Mexican.

But many people think that Mr Arpaio leaps from that fact to finding excuses to arrest people who look Hispanic in the hope of finding illegal immigrants.

Most days, protesters are encamped in front of Mr Arpaio's office tower in Phoenix, accusing him of racism. And federal investigators are looking into his methods.

"It is a reign of terror," says Phil Gordon, the mayor of Phoenix and Mr Arpaio's most outspoken enemy.

Mr Arpaio "goes into Hispanic neighbourhoods and rounds up people" while neglecting many ordinary criminals, he charges.

Mr Gordon believes that there are more dangerous elements in the area than dishwashers and that Mr Arpaio's excessive zeal is giving Phoenix, Arizona's capital and largest city, a bad name.

Oddly enough, Mr Arpaio seems to be stepping up his efforts just as illegal immigrants seem to be leaving in droves.

Arizona is one of the states worst hit by foreclosures and has been losing jobs faster than any state but Michigan this year.

The job losses have been worst in sectors such as construction and retailing that employ many undocumented Mexicans.

Dennis Hoffman, an economics professor at Arizona State University's business school, estimates that more than 200,000 Latinos have left the state in the past year alone.

Mr Arpaio retorts that he has seen no decrease in illegals. "We lock them up every day," he says.

Maybe they are on their way to places where the economy is better and "we catch them coming through," he guesses.

In any case, who cares? As long as there are illegals, he will go after them.

Nor is Mr Arpaio daunted by the Department of Homeland Security, run by Janet Napolitano, with whom Mr Arpaio, a Republican, claims to have got on well when she was governor of Arizona even though she is a Democrat.

This month the department stripped Mr Arpaio's deputies of their authority to make arrests in the field on behalf of federal immigration agents.

But Mr Arpaio's staff will continue to run immigration checks inside his jails.

Mr Arpaio is defiant. He blames the liberal Obama administration for the move and asserts that, regardless, his deputies will continue arresting people—for cracked windshields, loose tailpipes or whatever—and checking their legal status under state laws afterwards.

To his critics this attitude proves that the sheriff is running amok. Mr Arpaio is in his fifth term and enjoys stunning voter approval in polls, but Mr Gordon compares his practices to those of racist sheriffs in the Jim Crow South: "being elected doesn't make it right."

There are also charges that Mr Arpaio employs McCarthyist tactics against his critics, intimidating and harassing county officials, legislators or journalists with bogus investigations and charges.

One senior state legislator, a fellow Republican, says that "Arpaio is out of control" but is afraid to go on the record.

Mr Arpaio, as is his wont, seems to gloat at such accusations. "Do I go after people? Yes," he says. But "why are they concerned if they have nothing to hide?" In any case, he says, crime is down "not because of the mayor's police" but "because I put all the illegals in jail. I come in here with my posse and my deputies and he doesn't like that." He believes he has 98% name recognition in the state and perhaps the country. "I could be governor, and everybody knows it," he says.

http://www6.lexisnexis.com/publisher/En ... 60&start=1

"It is a reign of terror," says Phil Gordon, the mayor of Phoenix and Mr Arpaio's most outspoken enemy.

Mr Arpaio "goes into Hispanic neighbourhoods and rounds up people" while neglecting many ordinary criminals, he charges.

So much BS, Joe is a patriot and he is enforcing the law and protecting the American people. No telling how many American lives he has saved by arresting illegals and getting them deported. He deserves a BIG thank you from all Americans!!!

Parking Tickets are Racist! The enforcement agents in my neighborhood give 19 out of 20 tickets to Asians! Of course my neighborhood is 99% Asian but using the reasoning of IA huggers it must be a racist thing.

I dont know if Sheriff Joe is even looking at the larger picture but he is helping nearly EVERY American in the U S (save the few who exploit illegal cheap labor)

The Politicians just see American citizens as acceptable casualties in their push for globalization and a north american union...

dispicable