Prepare for a hot summer to get hotter.
Yes, it appears that the federal government is dfefinitely going to sue the state of Arizona over its immigration law. Senator Jon Kyl pointed out at a conference sponsored by the Independent Women’s Forum that Arizona’s law was a reaction to what Arizonans regard as the federal government’s dereliction of duty: the feds aren’t providing a secure border, and, as a result, Kyl said, Phoenix is now the second largest kidnapping city in the world (after Mexico City).
But the issue before the courts won’t be whether the law was needed-it will be whether it’s constitutional. The federal government-not state governments-are charged with immigration policy. This constitutional issue was raised repeatedly on our IWF panel. My blog for that day includes these notes on what Viet Dinh, a law professor at Georgetown, had to say:
Dinh says the one issue that is new is the issue of preemption. (Federal law preempts state law.) Dinh thinks that the real question is, “Is the Arizona law in conflict with federal law?” Dinh says that it is hard to see a conflict–the Arizona simply says it is going to provide the resources to enforce federal law. The feds say, basically, we’ll enforce it when we can get around to it. If the president signed an agreement with Mexico that we were to enforce only a percentage of immigration law, then there might be a conflict. There is no conflict now.
Another supporter of the law, Manhattan Institute scholar Heather Mac Donald, believes that people oppose the law because it works. She says that the real question is whether we are serious about enforcement of immigration law.