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Arizona crackdown driving out illegal immigrants
Associated Press ^ | AMANDA LEE MYERS

Posted on 12/22/2007 10:07:48 AM PST by Dubya

PHOENIX — Illegal immigrants in Arizona, frustrated with a flagging economy and tough new legislation cracking down on their employers, are returning to their home countries or trying their luck in other states.

For months, immigrants have taken a wait-and-see attitude toward the state's new employer-sanctions law, which takes effect Jan. 1. The voter-approved legislation is an attempt to lessen the economic incentive for illegal immigrants in Arizona, the busiest crossing point along the U.S.-Mexico border.

And by all appearances, it's starting to work.

"People are calling me telling me about their friend, their cousin, their neighbors — they're moving back to Mexico," said Magdalena Schwartz, an immigrant-rights activist and pastor at a Mesa church. "They don't want to live in fear, in terror."

Martin Herrera, a 40-year-old illegal immigrant and masonry worker who lives in Camp Verde, 70 miles north of Phoenix, said he is planning to return to Mexico as soon as he ties up loose ends after living here for four years.

"I don't want to live here because of the new law and the oppressive environment," he said. "I'll be better in my country."

He called the employer-sanctions law "absurd."

"Everybody here, legally or illegally, we are part of a motor that makes this country run," Herrera said. "Once we leave, the motor is going to start to slow down."

There's no way to know how many illegal immigrants are leaving Arizona, especially now with many returning home for normal holidays visits. But economists, immigration lawyers and people who work in the immigrant community agree it's happening.

State Rep. Russell Pearce of Mesa, the author of the employer sanctions law, said his intent was to drive illegal immigrants out of Arizona.

"I'm hoping they will self-deport," Pearce said. "They broke the law. They're criminals."

Under the employer sanctions law, businesses found to have knowingly hired illegal workers will be subject to sanctions from probation to a 10-day suspension of their business licenses. A second violation would bring permanent revocation of the license.

Nancy-Jo Merritt, an immigration lawyer who primarily represents employers, said her clients already have started to fire workers who can't prove they are in the country legally.

"Workers are being fired, of course," she said. "Nobody wants to find out later on that they've got somebody working for them who's not here legally."

When immigrants don't have jobs, they don't stick around, said Dawn McLaren, a research economist at Arizona State University who specializes in illegal immigration.

She said the flagging economy, particularly in the construction industry, also is contributing to an immigrant exodus.

"As the jobs dwindle and the environment becomes more unpleasant in more ways than one, you then decide what to do, and perhaps leaving looks like a good idea," she said. "And certainly that creates a problem, because as people leave, they take the jobs they created with them."

Pearce disagreed that the Arizona economy will suffer after illegal immigrants leave, saying there will be less crime, lower taxes, less congestion, smaller classroom sizes and shorter lines in emergency rooms.

"We have a free market. It'll adjust," he said. "Americans will be much better off."

He said he's not surprised illegal immigrants are leaving the state and predicts that more will go once the employer-sanctions law takes effect next month.

"It's attrition by enforcement," he said. "As you make this an unfriendly state for lawbreakers, I'm hoping they will pick up and leave."


TOPICS: News/Current Events; US: Arizona
KEYWORDS: aliens; enforcement; fightingback; illegalimmigration; immigrantlist
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To: Dubya

“And by all appearances, it’s starting to work.”

Gee, and they said it wouldn’t work!


61 posted on 12/22/2007 12:33:31 PM PST by aquila48
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To: Borax Queen; yorkie; Czar
there will be less crime, lower taxes, less congestion, smaller classroom sizes and shorter lines in emergency rooms.

"We have a free market. It'll adjust," he said. "Americans will be much better off."

BumPing that one!!!

62 posted on 12/22/2007 12:37:36 PM PST by nicmarlo
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To: Dubya
Photobucket
63 posted on 12/22/2007 12:39:38 PM PST by -=SoylentSquirrel=- (I'm really made of people!)
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To: Paul Ross
You reminded me of this poster:

traitor kennedy

64 posted on 12/22/2007 12:45:20 PM PST by -=SoylentSquirrel=- (I'm really made of people!)
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To: Dubya
Arizona crackdown driving out illegal immigrants

Now if we can get that here in Florida...= )~

65 posted on 12/22/2007 12:50:55 PM PST by StnCldTruth (A gun in your hand is better than a cop on the phone !!!!!)
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To: JohnD9207

California is bankrupt. It is time for another recall.


66 posted on 12/22/2007 1:01:04 PM PST by BobS (Did Santa just say haha, HO ?!)
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To: Dubya

67 posted on 12/22/2007 1:01:07 PM PST by Hugin (Mecca delenda est!)
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To: StnCldTruth

From your lips to God’s Ear!


68 posted on 12/22/2007 1:01:12 PM PST by Talking_Mouse (O Lord, destroy Islam by converting the Muslims to Christianity.)
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To: Dubya
"I don't want to live here because of the new law and the oppressive environment," he said. "I'll be better in my country."

Hey now that's what we've been wanting to hear!!

69 posted on 12/22/2007 1:02:07 PM PST by Niteflyr ("If you’re drawing flak, you know you're over the target".)
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To: navyguy
Complete and utter horse squeeze. Illegals don’t ‘create jobs’. They TAKE jobs from hard working and skilled Americans. What they DO create is overcrowding, high healthcare costs, higher taxes for education and incarceration and a lawless subculture that totally undermines the Rule of Law.

Amen to that!!...especially the "undermine rule of law"...this has been a free-for-all in this country for far too long!

70 posted on 12/22/2007 1:05:30 PM PST by Niteflyr ("If you’re drawing flak, you know you're over the target".)
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To: libs_kma
Everybody here, legally or illegally, we are part of a motor that makes this country run," Herrera said. "Once we leave, the motor is going to start to slow down."

I call Bravo Sierra. Let them leave, and the hole will be filled with legal immigrants. If we have to allow more in, at least we can weed out the scum of the earth that swims the river today.

Exactly...anyone who thinks the vacuum won't be filled is delusional....the motor will probably gain speed due to efficiency because of all the wasted energy trying to deal with a bunch of lawless bottom feeders...

71 posted on 12/22/2007 1:19:43 PM PST by Niteflyr ("If you’re drawing flak, you know you're over the target".)
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To: DesScorp
Of course, Bill O’Reilly tells us we can’t send them home...

And G.W. Bush, and John McCain, and many, many other "elites".

72 posted on 12/22/2007 1:30:48 PM PST by GATOR NAVY
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To: ASA Vet
Come on. This is a time of charitable giving. Lets donate to help people get home. In a big sense. Sunchronize 5 diesel-electric locomotive engines in Barstow, CA to pull a 3 mile long train full of people that just want to go home. It goes right past here and on the side of San Diego. Those tracks stop just inside Tijuana. Lets finance this with charitable donations. Let's just help these people get back home with their loved ones.

And make the donations tax-deductible.


73 posted on 12/22/2007 1:31:12 PM PST by BobS (Did Santa just say haha, HO ?!)
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To: Dubya
In other news, sub-standard housing in Arizona is suddenly suffering from a lack of tenants. Congress is funding a billion dollar grant to study the cause....
74 posted on 12/22/2007 1:35:04 PM PST by Bernard (If you always tell the truth, you never have to remember exactly what you said.)
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To: Emmett McCarthy
Someone, somewhere is considering posting this is exactly what El Jefe Grande was planning all along.

All part of his Grande Stategery with the hispandering and such.

I’d wager there’s going to be a lot of high level pressure brought to bear on Arizona to quash these restrictions on criminal enterprises.

75 posted on 12/22/2007 1:41:53 PM PST by Dr.Zoidberg (Mohammedanism - Bringing you only the best of the 6th century for fourteen hundred years.)
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To: Dubya
"Once we leave, the motor is going to start to slow down."

If only it would slow down. Fast growing is not the same as having a good qulaity of life:

Maricopa County is located in the central part of Arizona. As of July 2006 its population was 3,768,123, which ranks fourth among the nation's counties and is greater than the population of 23 states.

The population explosion is evident in a 2007 Forbes Magazine study which ranked four of Maricopa County's municipalities in the top ten fastest-growing cities in the nation. (snip)

76 posted on 12/22/2007 1:42:15 PM PST by donna (Perhaps if republicans would adhere to the Bible’s first 10 Commandments they wouldn’t need an 11th.)
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To: SHEENA26; Dubya

Arpaio supported Napolitano (Hillary’s gift to Arizona) in her run for the governor’s office in 2002.


77 posted on 12/22/2007 1:49:50 PM PST by donna (Perhaps if republicans would adhere to the Bible’s first 10 Commandments they wouldn’t need an 11th.)
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To: Dubya

Illegal aliens do create jobs. Their Mexican Markets, their Mexican restaurants, check cashing stores, graffiti removers, bilingual school teachers, credit insurers, welfare workers, Antonio Villalagros’s job, all the judges of the 9th circuit, border patrols, coyotes, drug smugglers, counterfeiters…the list goes on.


78 posted on 12/22/2007 1:59:44 PM PST by Haddit (Hunter is still the Best)
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To: Dubya

Imagine that, dry up illegal jobs and people go home..


79 posted on 12/22/2007 2:02:14 PM PST by ears_to_hear (2Cr 4:3 But if our gospel be hid, it is hid to them that are lost:)
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To: donna
Holy moly
IF they counted the Mexicans (that is, after all, what they are) those numbers would be much higher.

I grew up in AZ, hate to visit because it now feels so much like Mexico. Heritage is one thing, an army of invading illegals is altogether different.

80 posted on 12/22/2007 2:08:42 PM PST by ASOC
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