Posted on 07/06/2010 4:24:39 PM PDT by PJ-Comix
As widely anticipated, Attorney General Eric Holder today filed a lawsuit against Arizona and Gov. Jan Brewer over the state’s immigration law. The suit seeks a preliminary injunction to stop the law from being implemented.
The court filing states that Arizona law is pre-empted by federal law and therefore violates the supremacy clause of the U.S. Constitution.
The filing makes no assertion that the law is discriminatory or risks being applied in a discriminatory fashion, as the president and other officials said they feared would be the case. Interestingly, this suit makes no civil rights charges against the Arizona law.
You can read the complaint HERE and the preliminary injunction brief HERE.
“The State of Arizona has crossed this constitutional line,” write Assistant Attorney General Tony West, United States Attorney Dennis K. Burke and others. “In acknowledged disagreement with the manner in which the federal government has regulated immigration and in contravention of these constitutional principles…The states are not permitted to set their own independent immigration policies, with varying and potentially conflicting enforcement systems and priorities. Were a number of states to act as Arizona has and strike out on their own, federal immigration policy and enforcement efforts would be crippled.”
The suit states that the Arizona law pursues only the goal of “attrition” while ignoring other objectives Congress has established for the federal immigration system.
You can read more about the lawsuit in THIS PIECE by Senior Justice Correspondent Pierre Thomas.
-Jake Tapper
UPDATE: Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Kentucky, released a statement saying: “Suing the people of Arizona for attempting to do a job the federal government has utterly failed to execute will not help secure our borders. If the President wants to make real progress on this issue, he can do so by taking amnesty off the table and focus his efforts on border and interior security. It is long past time for this administration to prioritize solving a crisis over imposing an agenda and the first step is to recognize that attorneys and amnesty are not acceptable alternatives to border security and job creation.”
Gov. Brewer, meanwhile, is soliciting donations to help defend the state from the Justice Department lawsuit, tweeting: "We will be very aggressive in defending our law. Donate to help keep AZ safe.”
The DOJ is wrong. Blatantly and obviously.
Commie bastards.
Maybe the local authorities in AZ should stop arresting kidnappers, bank robbers, and the like. Would not want to step on any Federal toes after all./sarc
Absolutely they do, don’t anyone be fooled.
Every single day this bozo does some idiot thing to tear down the nation. Every single day.
Meanwhile in AZ....things are just peachy as long as you don’t travel outside of the city limits. Move along. Nothing to see here. Kidnapping capital of the world.
Supremacy clause is bogus in this case. First, because AZ is not taking over immigration enforcement from the Feds, only dealing with its failed aftermath.
Second, the Feds have abdicated their responsibility in regards to illegal immigration. As the Tenth Amendment spells out, the states are free to assume responsibilities which are not claimed by the Feds.
I agree with the others, they know EXACTLY what they are doing; they are trying to destroy the republic and the Constitution and replace it with a socialist “democracy” where the people are ruled over by the fed-god and everyone and everything answers to the fed-god. Your “rights” will be determined by the fed-god.
Basically, they plan on destroying the 5000 year leap and replacing it with a system of bureaucrats, the ruling elite and their supporters, and the peasants. If you haven’t make your millions by then, you will be forever forced into peasant status whose job it is to support the lifestyle of the ruling class and bureaucrats.
Commie bastards.
Ok fine. So Arizona or any other state can chose to not enforce any federal law as the feds are currently doing. And the Feds according to the constitution shall protect us from invasion. They are not performing their constitutional duties. WTF is this? I guess any state can just say "screw you DC" we will not enforce your laws.
Obama wants to be Borbachev.
Clinton wouldn't have made this mistake. He'd have read the polls first. The worst thing that could happen to the Democrat party in November is if this thing bleeds them until October, and it will. The amateurs around 0bama will respond in the only way they know: with a massive media campaign and a few rent-a-mobs. It will only make matters worse.
Pathetic.
I have never heard Obama state that he opposed the Arizona bill on these grounds. It was always because of discrimination concerns (which are non-existent).
It would seem this opens up the door for the defense to air for the America people the failures of this administration (and others) in enforcing our immigration laws.
That is absolutely true. Any state can decline to enforce Federal law. Example: California will not enforce federal pot laws.
I live in the sanctuary state of Maryland. Working on it.
More info available here:
http://michellemalkin.com/2010/07/06/doj-vs-arizona-the-battle-over-preemption/
Thank you. I like these kinds of arguments because I believe they more accurately reflect what the parties will assert.
That said, I believe AZ can show injury and that in the absence of federal remedy their law is necessary. They are not in appeals court so it is not I believe just a matter of law.
They are in federal court and will follow court rules there. They are defendants but they can countersue to show they are the injured party.
AZ can inquire as to a person’s residence of origin, the state or nation of origin for any criminal violator. AZ can enact laws that exclusively target criminals that are foreign nationals without legal presence. AZ can enact a law that effectively inprisons illegal immigrants indefinitely until an intervention by the federal government or by the government of the country the illegal originates from.
AZ has a lot of power and jurisdiction. I have read nothing of AZ deporting or processing aliens for any sort of immigration matter. I have read only of their law to detain criminals without legal residence until the federal government takes custody. So there is no preemption, the fed lawyers have concocted no substantial claim or material breach of jurisdiction, nothing other that AZ is somehow preempted from what? From investigating where a criminal originates from and detaining them until they are picked by the feds or are otherwise returned to their country of origin? If a criminal from TX is caught in AZ, the same process form takes hold in that AZ will coordinate with law enforcement in TX to return the criminal and transfer custody. It is no difference if the criminal is from Syria or Columbia, the criminal will be detained until returned from whence they came either by feds takiing custody or court order brought on by persons in the country of origin.
So I think the fed case is really weak because they cannot stop AZ from detaining criminals. remember the AZ law does not single out illegals, it investigates the origin of persons charged with a crime which it has jurisdiction to do. It has the jurisdiction to investigate and determine the identity and origin of persons charged with crimes. The AZ law says that those criminal suspects that cannot prove legal residence within the jurisdiction of the United States, such suspects can be detained.
Now if the AZ law said they could investigate any person of lawful residence without an accompanying criminal violation charge, then yes the feds would have a case. But the AZ law does not say that. The AZ law says that a person charged with committing a crime will also be investigated as to their identity and origin, be it Oklahoma or Columbia or any other place, and not necessarily for the purpose of deportation, but for the purpose of release back to the place of jurisdiction. There is nothing wrong in this line of prosecution that I can see.
And as many have already pointed out on the forum, the Holder lawsuit does not include any language of civil rights violations or discrimination. It only claims jurisdiction and supremacy. The legal arguments are not even there that address AZ’s law itself.
So it's wrong to criminalize something that's already illegal?
They should at least find someone who has been to Law School to write these things. This is just plain stupid.
Don’t the police arrest on federal laws?
I remember one time where I worked someone was accused of breaking a federal law and they had local law enforcement arrest her at work.
By the way the employer had no basis to have her arrested and the police apologized to her but they had to arrest her since he filed charges and presented evidence that looked legitimate.
She didn’t sue the police she sued the company and won a nice settlement (i think over a quarter million) it’s been 8 years I don’t remember the exact details.
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