Arizonans and The Nation Torn On Immigration Bill

[sachinky 465]

You are aware it is against Federal Employment Law for an employer to specifically ask for a green card if the alien has a driver's license and an unrestricted Social Security card, aren't you?

No, I wasn't aware so thanks for that tidbit, irrelevant as it is.

It seems that your unrestricted SSN coupled with your driver's license would probably give your employer a good idea about your legal status in the U.S.

LPRs are required to carry their GC on their person at all times by federal law. How is enforcing that law or taking it one step further and saying that even citizens may be required to carry a proof of citizenship ID a "human rights violation?"

[The_Dude 1,142]

they better address it, then put the funds & resources into ICE. if this law makes it to the implementation stage every border state + some farther north will draft similiar laws. then the feds are fvcked. & the question to the US gov't will be...'do you represent the interest of the people of the US or do you represent the interest of the people of north & south america?'

& they pulled it prior to the november elections...genius from the republicans isn't it?

It could backfire. First and foremost, where do you get the money to fully fund this? You have two options, raise taxes, or cut spending. Of course nobody wants to raise taxes, least of all republicans, so cut spending it is. Where do we cut spending? Before you say "entitlements, welfare, foreign aid", they don't make up enough to fully fund ICE to the expanded level proposed. Which leaves us with defense, Medicaid and social security. If you think any politician, from either side is willing to touch the budgets of any of those, you're insane. States can pass these laws all they want to and the federal government can just ignore them like the petulent children they are behaving like. If states call the federal government out and see no results, then they just appear like ineffectual nothings.

[Rebecca Jo 1,962]

No, it doesn't bother me.

If I choose to live in a country, I choose to follow it's laws.

It's not gonna kill me to provide an ADDITIONAL piece of document that a white man might not have to -- neither is it going to inconvenience me in the slightest. Is it unfair that I would be asked to provide something a white man wouldn't be? Sure, yea. But whatevs. I roll with it. Life is too short to get hot and bothered about every darned thing.

The US government doesn't give you a green card because you are brown. It gives green cards to all aliens no matter what color they are.

Once you naturalize, are you going to go to the extra expense of carrying a US passport card around in your wallet just in case someone stops you because you are brown?

It might not bother you that you have to carry around extra documentation because of your skin color. But as a US citizen, it sickens me.

[Trumplestiltskin 5,791]

It does not bother you that because you are "brown skinned" (as you call it) that if you had a traffic violation in Arizona, you might be asked to provide an ADDITIONAL identity document that a white person would not be asked to produce under the same circumstances?

What if you are a white person in Arizona who gets pulled over for a traffic violation, and you hand over your driving license to the officer without speaking. Once the "transaction" is concluded, you say "Have a nice day, Officer" with your thick British accent, and THEN he asks you for your green card?

You really haven't thought this through, have you?

This is really the heart of the problem - if you give the police police broad sweeping powers to question a person's immigration status without sufficient guidelines as to how to implement the policy, you expose the police (as an institution) to charges of institutional racism.

Unless everyone who is pulled over or otherwise stopped by a police officer in the State of Arizona is questioned about their immigrant status, the situation will certainly arise where people start to ask why they are being treated different to other people.

It's not that police officers are overtly racist (though there is always some element of that within the force), it's that by giving them carte blanche without any reasonable means of determining who might be an illegal immigrant, other than say racial/ethnic characteristics - is likely to create a situation (as happened in the UK in the 1960's) where police officers routinely short-cut the process of reasoning out of convenience and start enforcing that law with an inherent racial bias.

[Rebecca Jo 1,962]

No, I wasn't aware so thanks for that tidbit, irrelevant as it is.

It seems that your unrestricted SSN coupled with your driver's license would probably give your employer a good idea about your legal status in the U.S.

LPRs are required to carry their GC on their person at all times by federal law. How is enforcing that law or taking it one step further and saying that even citizens may be required to carry a proof of citizenship ID a "human rights violation?"

It's not an irrelevant tidbit. The Federal government has imposed limitations on how far an employer can go in the name of prevention of workplace discrimination. Discrimination is the issue at hand.

It might interest you to know that the Constitution provides for free movement of people between the states and limits the power of the States to restrict such movement. In other words, no "where are your papers, comrade".

Nobody is saying an alien should not carry their green card. The point you seem to be missing is being asked for additional documentation because of how you look.

[Trumplestiltskin 5,791]

and what I am saying here is not hard to understand, there are plenty of other laws that target criminals(as this bill does) but could be used to discriminate towards certain races.

Lets say a person is pulled aside for a minor offense, he/she cant speak English or provide ID all the while acting nervous. Would you believe that to be probable cause? Theres a lot of Mexicans in AZ and cops aren't going to pull over every Mexican. Its going to take a lot more than being a given race for cops to haul someone down to the station. Do you not think that if it was a German man under the same circumstances that the cops wouldn't care and let him go?

We can go around the houses with hypothetical situations, the reality is that it will always come down to what you personally want to believe. You will convince yourself, but that's about it and the entire exercise becomes utterly pointless.

I might suggest to you that you look at this from the point of view of historical precedent.

This is something that has been tried before, and it didn't end well.

[sachinky 465]

Once you naturalize, are you going to go to the extra expense of carrying a US passport card around in your wallet just in case someone stops you because you are brown?

I don't understand how it is an extra expense to carry around a photocopy of your passport. Should I ever choose to naturalize, that's what I'll do. It's just a piece of paper.

[SMOKE 1,426]

It could backfire. First and foremost, where do you get the money to fully fund this? You have two options, raise taxes, or cut spending. Of course nobody wants to raise taxes, least of all republicans, so cut spending it is. Where do we cut spending? Before you say "entitlements, welfare, foreign aid", they don't make up enough to fully fund ICE to the expanded level proposed. Which leaves us with defense, Medicaid and social security. If you think any politician, from either side is willing to touch the budgets of any of those, you're insane. States can pass these laws all they want to and the federal government can just ignore them like the petulent children they are behaving like. If states call the federal government out and see no results, then they just appear like ineffectual nothings.

and thats why its genius. no matter what happens the dems are holding the bag.

[sachinky 465]

Nobody is saying an alien should not carry their green card. The point you seem to be missing is being asked for additional documentation because of how you look.

What additional document are you talking about, firstly? A document--your Green Card--should suffice and you're required by law to carry it on your person at all times, to begin with.

[Rebecca Jo 1,962]

I don't understand how it is an extra expense to carry around a photocopy of your passport. Should I ever choose to naturalize, that's what I'll do. It's just a piece of paper.

All right. You have no problem producing what is legally required of you, correct?

I have explained to you above what an employer may legally do in the US when hiring an LPR.

Say you are the LPR and you have just been hired for a job. You produce your state issued driver's license and your unrestricted Social Security card as a means of proving your identity and your work authorization.

But your employer still asks you for your green card?

Is this discrimination?

[Trumplestiltskin 5,791]

No, it doesn't bother me.

If I choose to live in a country, I choose to follow it's laws.

It's not gonna kill me to provide an ADDITIONAL piece of document that a white man might not have to -- neither is it going to inconvenience me in the slightest. Is it unfair that I would be asked to provide something a white man wouldn't be? Sure, yea. But whatevs. I roll with it. Life is too short to get hot and bothered about every darned thing.

If you aren't prepared to stand up for your right for equal treatment, then you have no self-respect and deserve what you get (not unlike the people that moan about government but then don't bother to vote). I mean if you don't feel that being held to a higher standard to prove who you are is an "inconvenience" just how far would you have to be pushed before it becomes "inconvenient"? What about that one time where you forget your wallet in the house - and you get stopped for speeding or having a tail light out?

Will it be "inconvenient" to have your wife bail you out of jail in the middle of the night?

The fact that there are protests over this legislation suggests that a lot of people are taking this issue rather more seriously than you are.

[Rebecca Jo 1,962]

What additional document are you talking about, firstly? A document--your Green Card--should suffice and you're required by law to carry it on your person at all times, to begin with.

I am a white US citizen. I run a red light. I get a ticket.

Does the officer normally want me to prove my citizenship?

[The_Dude 1,142]

and thats why its genius. no matter what happens the dems are holding the bag.

I really don't see it like that, but I suppose to each his own. You can hardly blame the entirety of this on Democrats when it seems to have been a pervasive problem across party lines for decades. Who was the last president to actually grant amnesty?

[Rebecca Jo 1,962]

and thats why its genius. no matter what happens the dems are holding the bag.

And that's the only reason this legislation was enacted. It's a law with no teeth that makes for great political grandstanding.

[Trumplestiltskin 5,791]

And that's the only reason this legislation was enacted. It's a law with no teeth that makes for great political grandstanding.

Totally.