Phoenix Does the Right Thing; ACLU Lawsuit In 5...4...

Mayor Phil Gordon announced a change in policy for the Phoenix PD:

The police in this city at the center of the immigration debate will soon ask all people arrested whether they are in the United States legally and will in certain cases report the information to the federal authorities, Mayor Phil Gordon announced on Friday.

People stopped for civil traffic violations like speeding will not be questioned, nor will crime victims or witnesses.

All those arrested on criminal charges like drunken driving and murder will be asked by officers whether they are in the United States legally.

The police may decide to recommend checking by Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

This is a good step. It gets at criminals without turning whole neighborhoods into police-free zones where people are too scared to call for help. Of course, pro-illegal groups are already calling it xenophobic, but, really, it's not like they've got a whole lot of other calls in their playbook.

Note that all arrestees are going to get asked, so there's no xenophobic discrimination at that end. A determination will then be made as to which will get passed on to ICE for further examination.

I like this observation:

Civil rights advocates suggested that people who appeared to be Latino or spoke with accents would be more likely to be checked than others.

Uh? Duh-har-dah-har. It's Phoenix. Of course Latinos are going to be checked more, geniuses. And there sure are a lot of illegal aliens with Southwest American English or flawless General American English, aren't there?

posted by Gabriel Malor at 10:45 PM

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