More states taking immigration law into their own hands
Arizona may be just the tip of the iceberg, the Christian Science Monitor reports: Oklahoma is looking at passing tougher penalties for illegal immigrants caught with firearms. South Carolina might make it illegal to hire workers on the side of the road. In addition, state immigration legislation is also being considered in Idaho, Utah, Missouri, ...
Arizona may be just the tip of the iceberg, the Christian Science Monitor reports:
Arizona may be just the tip of the iceberg, the Christian Science Monitor reports:
Oklahoma is looking at passing tougher penalties for illegal immigrants caught with firearms. South Carolina might make it illegal to hire workers on the side of the road. In addition, state immigration legislation is also being considered in Idaho, Utah, Missouri, Texas, North Carolina, Maryland, Minnesota, and Colorado.
In many cases, the potential legislation is merely part of the perpetual national debate about immigration, which has taken form in more than 200 state-level immigration bills being signed into law each year from 2007 to 2009, notes Catherine Wilson, a political scientist at Villanova University in Philadelphia.
As we saw in Arizona, states in the midst of a crisis aren’t necessarily going to enact the best of laws to get out of it. With Washington largely seemingly unwilling to touch the politically toxic issue, states are going to continue to deal with the problem themselves.
Joshua Keating was an associate editor at Foreign Policy. Twitter: @joshuakeating
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