Court Grants Temporary Injunction on parts of Arizona Immigration Law

Well those who have been following passage of the Arizona immigration law into practice today, will no doubt have learned that U.S. Federal Judge Susan Bolton has granted a preliminary stay on certain parts of the law which asks law enforcement officers to use reasonable judgement to discover whether or not a person is in the country illegally if stopped for a misdemeanor. i.e. If a person is stopped as a suspect then the officer would under the new law, be empowered to ask for I.D. in the same way an officer would ask any American citizen in the well known phrase "Can I see yer drivers licence please sir".

The law is in force today, but a judge has granted a temporary injunction in respect of giving officers the right to ask this question of suspects, and she has also given an injunction to the part where Arizona law would make it a crime for an illegal immigrant to seek employment and a crime to employ an illegal immigrant as well as a crime for an illegal immigrant not to carry papers validating their citizen status. Instead, the judge has ruled that Federal Law MUST be adhered to, which amounts to the same as Arizona simply want to assert Federal law under state law, as the Federal Govt is failing to implement it.

The judge ruled it was permissible for a citizen to sue the government for failing to carry out the law, so round one is plainly a matter of how you interpret the ruling. Personally, seeing reports of immigrants fleeing back across the border, I think the mere fact Jan Brewer has threatened such a law, has in fact done half the job she wanted. But despite this, the issue still rankles in court and it's a matter of politics as to which side has  'won' this first round. Meanwhile, Gov Brewer says that an expedited appeal will be launched by Arizona against this preliminary judgement which you can read in its entirety HERE.

Hispanic and immigrant workforce by the numbers

• 40 percent of all new workers in the U.S. workforce in 2006-07 were Latinos.

• 41 million U.S. Hispanics are estimated to account for 14 percent of the U.S. population.

• 13 percent of the U.S. labor force is Latino.

• 11 percent of all U.S. residents are immigrants; 14 percent of all workers and 20 percent of low-wage workers.

• 2 million Latino-owned businesses in the U.S. make nearly $300 million in annual sales.

Sources: Addeco: The Emerging Hispanic Workforce, Urban Institute Immigration Studies Program: A Profile of The Low-Wage Immigrant Workforce.

Read more: HERE