There is reality, and there is the law. And while we like to pretend that they operate on the same wavelength, the reality is that they often do not.
The recent federal court ruling by U.S. District Judge Susan Bolton shows that. Bolton has refused to strike down sections of Arizona’s racist SB 1070 law, particularly the odious part which allows police in Arizona to check the immigration status of anyone they stop. Voice of America News reports that “Bolton ruled that immigration rights activists failed to show that police would enforce the law differently for Hispanics than for other people.”
And Judge Bolton is completely, totally wrong and should concentrate his efforts on forex and not law.
It is puzzling how anyone who spends five minutes outside in Arizona could fail to realize that whatever may be written on the law books, the police will enforce this law differently for Hispanics. It is no different from how Jim Crow ostensibly promoted equality between blacks and whites.
If you believe otherwise, ask yourself this question: take a Chinese, or European person who came to this country legally and then just never left. In fact, this is a major problem which grand plans for a border wall do not address, as 40 percent of illegal immigrants come to the United States through that method. Most of them hail from Europe, Asia, and Africa.
Take a white European who overstayed his visa. And then take a hardworking Hispanic who has jumped through the onerous hoops which we impose on those who want to join this country. Who do you think a police officer will stop and demand immigration papers?
If your answer is the European, then I have some beachfront property in Arizona to sell you.
Perhaps Judge Bolton cannot see the racism high up in her judicial chair. But Hispanics who have to deal with the police harassing and interrogating them do. In a 2012 poll, 79 percent of Latinos said they were worried about legal Latinos being interrogated by the police due to this law. And this worry was biggest with second generation Latinos, not the first.
The fact that our government has created a system where immigrants feel less safe the longer they stay in this country is the total opposite of everything this country stands for.
But let us suppose that Bolton is right. That somehow, the police will be fair and impartial judging Hispanics, given that they have done a wonderful job recently demonstrating their impartiality with African Americans.
Even if we suppose that SB 1070 is not racist, there is no doubt that it is corrupt. Because as NPR reported back when this law was passed, private prison companies played a huge role in turning this bill into law. The Corrections Corporation of America spent tens of thousands of dollars to meet with state legislators and get them to pass this bill.
A bill which is based on nothing on racism and corruption should be destroyed and its supporters thrown out of office. And that reality is more important than some supposed “color-blind” justice.