Michiganders Hold Vigils to Protest Extreme Arizona Immigration Law
Legislation opposed by law enforcement, mandates racial profiling
Detroit
Saturday, April 24, 1:00 PM
Western High School, 1500 Scotten
State Representatives Tlaib and Young
UNITE-HERE Local 24 Political Director Dia Pearce
Ann Arbor
Saturday, April 24, 1:00 PM
Federal Building, 200 E. Liberty
In response to Arizona Governor Jan Brewer’s signing of the country’s most extreme anti-immigrant legislation, immigration reform supporters have organized vigils across the country.
The new law enshrines racial profiling, prevents local law enforcement from doing their jobs effectively, and will be prohibitively expensive to implement. These problems are in addition to the serious constitutional and legal questions surrounding the new law, guaranteeing that costly legal action is an inevitable outcome on enacting such a proposal. The law is opposed by Arizona law enforcement, a diverse coalition of faith leaders, immigrants’ advocates, civil rights leaders, and legal scholars.
Governor Brewer’s politically expedient decision is likely to have implications for the immigration debate. Emboldened by the success of a harshly anti-immigrant measure in Arizona and a failure of the federal government to lead on immigration reform, anti-immigrant legislators all over the country will likely introduce new extreme measures in their own state legislatures.