We knew SB 1070 author Russell Pearce was a fruitloop bigot, but emails released today by the ACLU, the result of a public records request, reveal how racist the clamheaded former senator is. In 2006, back when then-Senator Russell Pearce used to pal around with baby-killer J.T. Ready, he caught flak because he had forwarded an email message from the National Alliance, a neo-nazi group whose article contained anti-semetic language. Oh, that was a mistake, Pearce said, I didn't really read the article. Well, after seeing the emails that surfaced today, it makes you wonder if he didn't believe every word of the National Alliance's propaganda.
To catch up: Two big immigration stories are taking place this week in Phoenix: Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio's racial profiling trial began today, and the ACLU is asking a judge to block the remaining provision of the "papers please" law.
Arpaio's trial is a civil case that started in 2007—brought by a Mexican tourists legally visiting Arizona, who was detained nine hours by the Maricopa County Sheriff's Office (MCSO). The plaintiffs are not seeking a monetary settlement or even punishment for Arpaio; they simply want the Sheriff to admit his department racially profiles Hispanics. The blustering octogenarian refuses to do so, of course.
The use of race became "a basis of suspicion" in the MCSO, and the actions of Arpaio, Sands, and others demonstrated the "influence of race at the highest level" on MCSO operations, [attorney] Young explained. New Times
The case is also relying on the
Department of Justice's report filed last December, the result of a three-year investigation. The DOJ pointed out in no uncertain terms that Arpaio's deputies detain and harass Hispanics much more than others—whether they are drivers on the street or inmates in jail. A DOJ civil rights trial is likely, as is a grand jury indictment that's looking into abuse of powers charges. (Arpaio presided over his own
trial circus this week too: on Tuesday he held his second
birther press conference. It's not like he's trying to deflect attention away from his own legal shit storm or rally the wingnut base for the November election or anything.)
Today at the trial the plaintiffs introduced the results of a study conducted by Temple University professor Ralph Taylor, who corroborated most of the DOJ findings:
Hispanic names were 53.7 percent more likely to be checked during a saturation patrol when compared to non-saturation-patrol stops for the same day. Hispanics were up to 39.5 percent more likely to be stopped compared with dates one year earlier. And Hispanic names were around 22 percent more likely to be run by MCSO officers during a saturation patrol compared to all other days.
If you look up "racial profiling" in the dictionary, you'll find indicators like those. The trial is expected to reconvene next week, when the Sheriff himself may be called to testify. Too bad for Arpaio—he can't bluster and harumph his way out of this examination, like he does with reporters and other critics. Stay tuned.
The more repulsive news came today during the ACLU's appearance before Judge Susan Bolton, who blocked some of the worst elements of SB 1070 from taking effect shortly after finger-wavin' Jan Brewer signed the law in 2010. This week the civil rights group is asking Judge Bolton to enjoin the only provision of SB 1070 that the Supremes left in place last month when they struck down most of the law:
The Supreme Court struck down three provisions of Arizona's 2010 immigration law in June, but upheld the part that requires police officers to check the immigration status of people they stop for other reasons. Slate
Part of ACLU's strategy is to convince the judge that SB 1070 is racially motivated, and to prove that they requested Senator Russell Pearce's emails from 2006 until 2011—during the time Pearce, ALEC, the private prison industry, and others who benefit from a higher incarceration rate drew up SB 1070. Pearce overreached on the bigotry, of course, and his sorry butt was
recalled by Mesa voters last November. He's running for the senate again in a new district, but the tyrant's donations are trickling in at best, compared to his GOP primary opponent, and at least three restaurants turned down his request to hold fundraisers. The email messages released today won't help his campaign.
The Arizona Republic printed too many of the emails to regurgitate here, but let me leave you with a taste:
"Can we maintain our social fabric as a nation with Spanish fighting English for dominance ... It's like importing leper colonies and hope we don't catch leprosy. It's like importing thousands of Islamic jihadists and hope they adapt to the American Dream."
"9,000 people killed every year by illegal aliens," and "the illegal aliens in the United States have a crime rate that's two-and-a-half times that of non-illegal aliens." Ed: Not true.
"They create enclaves of separate groups that shall balkanize our nation into fractured nightmares of social unrest and poverty."
"Corruption is the mechanism by which Mexico operates. Its people spawn more corruption wherever they go because it is their only known way of life."
"Tough, nasty illegals and their advocates grow in such numbers that law and order will not subdue them. They run us out of our cities and states. They conquer our language and our schools. They render havoc and chaos in our schools."
"We are much like the Titanic as we inbreed millions of Mexico's poor, the world's poor and we watch our country sink."
Pearce studied at the feet of rightwing maniac Mormon fundy Cleon Skousen, who preached that the Constitution was divinely inspired, and the only people capable of saving democracy are white Mormon men. Any wonder where SB 1070 came from in Pearce's warped mind? Skousen's sick prophecy is embedded in Pearce's ugly rants: Mexicans are corrupt lepers who will destroy America.
That's why we need SB 1070!
As one might expect, the second comment on the Republic's website tonight says the story is "just more left wing nonsense from this rag." Now, two things: I've lived here most of my life, and no one has ever accused the Arizona Republic of being a left wing tool, except for these brain-dead numbnuts. And second, if I'm not mistaken Russell Pearce wrote the emails. The Republic reported it.
Yep, these are the stylings of one Russell Pearce, former President of the Arizona Senate—just a year ago the man referred to as "de facto governor" because his "papers please" bill and the hate it spawned were responsible for nitwit Brewer in the first place.
He's gone and won't return, at least this year. Now it's Arpaio's turn.