ForKai Wright, editor of ColorLines.com, a news analysis website, all the heated debate, protests and legal wrangling over the tough Arizona immigration law that was gutted by a federal judge last Wednesday boils down to simple math.
Arizona and its immigration law equal racial profiling - and racial profiling, under any circumstance, is racist and wrong, said the Brooklyn-based writer and editor to Aol. Black Voices:
"The way the law is written, it would ask police to profile people. It would actually require racial profiling, which is a situation black people are very familiar with.
"To attempt to identify someone as undocumented ... I don't see how you could write the law without racial profiling."
U.S. District Judge Susan Bolton ruled that Arizona law SB 1070, which would have empowered police to question people who they have a "reasonable suspicion" are illegal immigrants, intrudes in to federal immigration enforcement.
Bolton's decision backs up the Justice Department's argument and gave the Obama administration a victory in a legal battle that will likely go to the U.S. Supreme Court, since Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer has announced she will appeal the Bolton decision.
The Justice Department lawsuit against Arizona is supported by the clause in the U.S. Constitution that grants the federal government sole authority to create and enforce immigration law, but because the federal government authorizes local governments to assist in some immigration enforcement actions, the legality of Arizona's action is uncertain.
Bolton's decision blocked a provision to require police to check immigration status if they stop someone while enforcing other laws. Also on hold is a measure to criminalize the failure of immigrants to carry registration papers.
Civil rights groups and federal lawyers had objected to those provisions, in particular, while Arizona officials defended them as necessary to fight a tide of illegal immigration.
Wright said that while Bolton's injunction didn't address the issue of profiling, Attorney General Eric Holder has said that he is concerned by the prospect of racial profiling.
Debate on the Arizona law has split opinions across the nation, with supporters of the law saying they want immigration law strictly enforced and opponents like Wright who see profiling as central to the Arizona measure.
Defenders of the Arizona law say that because more than a dozen of other states are considering similar legislation, a popular groundswell is emerging for stronger immigration enforcement.
Wright said, however, that an orchestrated campaign by the conservative Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR) is behind the proposed legislation in many of those states:
"In these other states, the laws are being pushed by FAIR. They are not growing up from the people organically."
Bob Dane, a FAIRspokesman, told Aol. Black Voices that the Washington, D.C.-based group helped Arizona craft its law but denied the group is behind any campaign to spread similar laws to other states:
"There is no grand scheme or lead architect to spread these laws," Dane said. "It is a grass-roots movement made up of people who have had enough of illegal immigration."
As far as popular polls that show a majority of Americans supporting immigration law enforcement, Wright said that mere popularity shouldn't decide what becomes law and what doesn't:
"Some areas of law that should be left to popular opinion but others areas should be more reflective of our values as a nation," Wright said. "And any law that requires police to check people in this way goes against our values."
I agree with Wright that no matter what you call it, officers will likely use some degree of racial profiling to determine who they suspect may be in the country illegally.
But is that necessarily evil?
Yes, someone in Arizona who speaks with a Spanish accent will be subjected to greater scrutiny. But let's be honest for a second. Illegal immigrants in states that border Mexico will be of Spanish descent. It's simple common sense.
If this country had an illegal immigrant problem with Sweden, then it would not be unreasonable to suspect people who spoke with a Swedish accent and had Swedish features.
I understand that people of Spanish descent who are legal citizens will be inconvenienced from time to time by officers inquiries. If the inquiries become abusive, those incidents can be challenged in court and those officers punished. But in life, inconvenience in the name of protecting the law is a part of life.
When I drive through a drunk driving check point, I am inconvenienced every time I am forced to stop and show the officer I have not been drinking.
Asking an officer to stop illegal immigration in a state that borders Mexico and not allowing them to take into account how they speak and what they look like is like making them wear blindfolds to do their jobs.
28-July-10 - An Ohio woman who helped counsel countless couples experiencing marital discord was found stabbed to death on Monday. The suspect is her husband.
27-July-10 - Mocienne Petit Jackson, a Netherlands woman who claims to be the child of pop sensation Michael Jackson and Diana Ross' sister, Barbara Ross, has filed documents in a Los Angeles court, according to TMZ.
23-July-10 - Could it be that Rangel simply forgot the rules? Did it slip his mind that he wasn't supposed to use his letterhead to get corporate donations for a building named after him, as charged? That's not the Charlie Rangel I knew, but that Rangel will surely be exposed when his trial starts.
23-July-10 - R&B heartthrob Brian McKnight, who was accused of being a long-lost baby daddy to a 14-year-old Florida boy, is not be the child's biological father.
22-July-10 - Staying out of trouble is not an easy feat for rapper Foxy Brown, who was arrested in Brooklyn on Wednesday for violating an order of protection, according to TMZ.
23-July-10 - A child pyromaniac is suspected of murdering his mother and siblings, setting fire to his home, and then slitting his own throat with a razor.
22-July-10 - Ieshuh Griffin is a legislative candidate from Wisconsin who seems willing to do whatever it takes to get elected. In the five words that candidates are allowed to put on the ballot to describe themselves, Griffin put the phrase, "Not the white man's b*tch."
21-July-10 - DeFarra Gaymon, a father of four and the CEO of Credit Union of Atlanta, was shot to death in a Newark, N.J. park known for male prostitution.
20-July-10 - Snoop Dogg and his wife revealed to People Magazine that the discovery that their then-6-year-old daughter, Cori, had lupus helped bring their family closer.
