Fear in Arizona, Hispanics as Challenges Loom

View Photo Gallery — President Obama on the 2012 campaign trail: President Obama’s reelection campaign is raising money and reaching out to voters and volunteers.

By Amanda J. Crawford, Updated: Tuesday, June 26, 3:22 PM

June 26 (Bloomberg) -- Erika Ovalle joined several dozen activists in the Phoenix heat outside the Immigration and Customs Enforcement office to protest the U.S. Supreme Court decision they say opens the door to racial profiling in Arizona.
“People are living in fear,” said Ovalle, 32, a U.S. citizen who volunteers with Puente Movement, an immigrant-rights group in a state that has become the epicenter of the nationwide battle over illegal migration. “It is criminalizing brown skin.”

The Washington Post’s Chris Cillizza gives the good news and the bad news for Mitt Romney out of the Supreme Court’s ruling on Arizona’s controversial immigration law.

Graphic

Explore the candidates’ campaign finances

As police prepare to begin enforcing the sole provision of Arizona’s first-of-its-kind immigration law to withstand the high court’s scrutiny, supporters and opponents agreed on one thing: The statute will face more legal challenges, especially if concerns over profiling or prolonged detentions materialize.
The justices in Washington struck down three provisions of the Arizona law that created state-level immigration crimes, in a ruling that reaffirmed the federal government’s exclusive role in setting policy. They left intact the most contentious provision -- known as “show me your papers” -- that requires local police to check the immigration status of anyone they suspect is in the country illegally during stops, arrests or detentions. The justices said the implementation had to respect constitutional protections.
The close scrutiny of how the law is enforced will likely shape how police in Arizona, and in four other states that have similar provisions in their laws, proceed.
“Officers will have to do it very, very carefully,” said Steven Schwinn, an associate professor at the John Marshall Law School in Chicago. “If they start racially discriminating or holding people longer than they should be, then that kind of enforcement would be subject to a constitutional challenge.”
Campaign Repercussions
The ruling gives President Barack Obama’s administration most of what it sought when it sued to block the Arizona law. Supporters of the law said the federal government isn’t doing enough to crack down on what officials have estimated are the 11.5 million people in the country illegally. The decision may undercut parts of similar laws in the other states and will have repercussions for the November presidential election as Obama and Republican candidate Mitt Romney vie for Hispanic votes.
Arizona, where officials say the 370-mile border with Mexico is the crossing point for half the nation’s illegal aliens, became the first state to enact such a law, in 2010. Since then, Alabama, South Carolina, Georgia, Utah and Indiana have passed their own measures aimed at illegal immigration. All are facing court fights.
Arizona Governor Jan Brewer declared that the court ruling “vindicated” her state’s efforts to fight illegal immigration, even as she said additional legal challenges were likely.
Eyes of World
“The eyes of the world will be upon us,” she said at a press conference. Earlier this month, Brewer, a Republican, ordered police agencies to review a training DVD in preparation for the ruling. Police, she said, “have been trained so that they can enforce this law efficiently, effectively and in harmony with the Constitution.”