From the Dispatch

Anti-immigrant Proposals Continue to Fail in Wake of Arizona’s Law

Suman Raghunathan — Mon, 26 Jul 2010 12:05:36 -0400

In the wake of the April 2010 passage of Arizona’s draconian and misguided anti-immigrant state law, SB 1070, which would give local governments responsibility to enforce federal immigration law, media coverage has focused on the many states, elected officials, and candidates who have voiced their support for similar anti-immigrant legislation. Despite the disturbing situation in Arizona, however, what is increasingly becoming clear is that anti-immigrant policies and initiatives are failing across the country in the wake of SB 1070’s passage, underlining Arizona’s anti-immigrant approach as an outlier.

As this Dispatch will detail, after considerable media hype about Arizona-style bills sweeping across the nation, the reality is that from from Nevada to Arkansas to Massachusetts to Kansas and Rhode Island, anti-immigrant bills and ballot initiatives largely didn't move or failed to make this fall's ballot. A key reason: most state leaders and police chiefs recognize that requiring local governments to assume immigration enforcement responsibilities from the federal government will distract them from fighting violent crime and undermine trust with local residents that are essential to successful community policing.

Table of Contents:

- A Trend of Failed Anti-Immigrant Proposals

- Anti-Immigrant Laws Increase Crime and Hamper Community Policing Efforts

- Lawsuits Against AZ SB 1070 Seek to Maintain Clear Federal Responsibility for Immigration Law

A Trend of Failed Anti-Immigrant Proposals

In the wake of AZ SB 1070’s passage in late April, a far right network of groups and legislators announced plans to move bills in state around the country. But the list of states rejecting those bills continues to grow and efforts to get anti-immigrant proposals on the ballot continue to fail.

Ballot Initiatives Fail in Nevada and Arkansas: The latest state to join this list is Nevada, where Assemblyman Chad Christensen’s effort to gather signatures for an anti-immigrant ballot initiative similar to Arizona’s recently faltered in the face of a lawsuit. Christensen’s effort was challenged by the Nevada Open For Business Coalition, a group that includes State Assemblymen Mo Denis and Ruben Kihuen as well as the Nevada Resort Association, the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority, the Las Vegas Latin Chamber of Commerce, and the NAACP. The coalition is also working with the Las Vegas Chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union. The delay caused by the Coalition's multiple legal challenges caused Christensen, who recently lost a June 8 US Senate Primary, to drop his petition rather than attempt to get his broad anti-immigrant proposal on the ballot.

In Arkansas, the anti-immigrant group Secure Arkansas also failed to get its anti-immigrant proposal (which simply re-iterated existing federal law by seeking to bar undocumented immigrants over the age of 14 from receiving public assistance) on the November 2010 ballot. Secretary of State Charlie Daniels rejected the group’s petition after finding they were nearly 10,000 signatures below the minimum required to appear on the ballot.

Anti-Immigrant Legislation Defeated or Blocked in Multiple States: In both Massachusetts and Rhode Island, state leadership refused to allow anti-immigrant legislation to gain traction. In Massachusetts, twenty-seven pages of anti-immigrant budget amendments that resembled Arizona's SB1070 was shot down and ultimately approved as a final bill which simply restated existing federal bars on undocumented immigrants accessing public benefits, and included no new anti-immigrant provisions.

Rhode Island’s anti-immigrant bill, introduced by conservative Democrat State Representative Peter Palumbo, did not even receive a public hearing earlier this summer: the bill was ‘killed’ by House Speaker Gordon Fox, who voiced his opposition to the bill and reiterated that enforcing immigration laws remains the responsibility of the federal government.

And in Kansas, when a conservative legislator sought to attach an Arizona-style anti-immigrant amendment to the state budget, Kansas Representative Delia Garcia challenged its late introduction on procedural grounds and the Republican chair of the chamber's Rules Committee ruled the amendment out of order.

Most High-Immigration States Have Taken a Positive Approach to Integrate New Immigrants: As PSN detailed in a 2008 report, only 11% of undocumented immigrants live in states that have enacted comprehensive punitive anti-immigrant policies. Far more states promote positive integration policies and believe leaving immigration enforcement policy to the federal government is the best approach.

Resources
Colorlines - The Far-Right Movement Behind Arizona Copycat Bill
Progressive States Network - The Anti-Immigrant Movement that Failed: Positive Integration Policies by States Still Far Outweigh Punitive Policies
Progressive States Network - State Immigration Policy to Promote National Change

Anti-Immigrant Laws Increase Crime and Hamper Community Policing Efforts

One reason many leaders are rejecting Arizona-style anti-immigrant policies is the clear evidence that they undermine public safety. Police chiefs nationwide, including the chiefs of Los Angeles, Houston, Philadelphia, New York, Phoenix, and Tucson, have consistently underlined their opposition to local enforcement of federal immigration law, citing the dramatic and negative impact these approaches have on community members’ willingness to cooperate with the police -- and predicted they will increase crime. Law enforcement leaders such as Salt Lake City Chief of Police Chris Burbank have voiced concerns that burdening them with enforcing federal immigration law will actually make communities less safe: witnesses will be less likely to assist police investigations for fear of disclosing their immigration status; women will fear reporting instances of domestic violence, and crimes will go unreported, affecting all residents' safety.

Recent evidence highlights this problem with anti-immigrant legislation.

More Immigrants Means Less Crime, Not More: Overall, states with high immigration levels have actually seen their crime levels decrease; updated FBI and law enforcement data debunk any connection between higher levels of immigration resulting in more crime. The Federal Bureau of Justice Statistics reports that violent crime declined by 35% from 1994 to 2001 -- a period when the nation saw its undocumented population double. This precipitous drop in crime is part of a national trend, one echoed along the U.S.-Mexico border and in immigrant-heavy cities such as San Diego, El Paso, New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, and Miami. In fact, even conservative groups found states with the steepest growth among their immigrant residents also report the lowest crime rates. In these 19 states, the total crime rate declined nearly 14% from 1999 to 2006.

Arizona Itself Shows Failure of Anti-Immigrant Approach: Evidence from Arizona highlights why local immigration enforcement is counterproductive to fighting crime. The FBI reports that violent crime has been falling in Arizona for years -- even as the state’s number of undocumented residents rose.

The glaring exception to this trend in Arizona is Maricopa County, which falls under the jurisdiction of its notorious Sheriff Joe Arpaio. Arpaio has devoted considerable (and often-scarce) law enforcement resources to apprehending undocumented residents county-wide. Arpaio’s insistence on apprehending otherwise law-abiding undocumented residents in high-profile (often televised) raids and routine stops of Latino drivers for immigration checks means the Sheriff’s Department has less time to focus on violent criminals and pursue felony warrants. The East Valley Tribune, an Arizona newspaper, won a 2008 Pulitzer Prize for their multi-part series on the evolution and impact of Arpaio’s anti-immigrant pursuits.

Despite his ‘law and order’ rhetoric, Arpaio’s approach is a failed law enforcement strategy, and one that has apparently served to increase crime in his jurisdiction-contrary to state crime trends. Recent data from the Arizona Department of Public Safety and compiled by America’s Voice found the Maricopa County crime rate increased by 58% from 2002 to 2009, while the state as a whole saw an average 12% decrease in crime rates. Other Arizona localities that did not engage in broad raids and traffic stops saw their crime rates plunge during the same period: Phoenix enjoyed a 14% decrease in crime; Tempe saw a 26% decrease; and Mesa (Senator Pearce’s district) experienced a 31% decrease.

Misinformation from the Anti-Immigrant Right: Many anti-immigrant legislators and candidates have issued a steady drumbeat of misinformation that attempts to draw a connection between immigrants and crime. AZ Governor Jan Brewer, State Sen Russell Pearce, Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio and national anti-immigrant groups such as the Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR) have attempted to justify and explain their efforts toward draconian state immigration legislation by claiming their proposals will make communities safer.

Yet even as Pearce and Brewer have, in fact, predicted that their state’s anti-immigrant measures will result in lower levels of crime throughout Arizona, evidence from Maricopa County shows that exporting Sheriff Joe Arpaio's brand of anti-immigrant policing will likely reverse the progress made in other parts of the state, imposing Maricopa's failed model on the the whole state.

Resources:
Immigration Policy Center - Arizona's Punishment Doesn't Fit the Crime: Studies Show Decrease in Arizona Crime Rates Over Time
Immigration Policy Center - New FBI data Confirms Falling Crime Rates in Arizona: Violent Crimes Are Down in the State's Three Largest Cities
America's Voice - Arizona Immigration Law Could Lead to Surge in Violent Crime
America's Voice - Fact Sheet: Sheriff Joe Arpaio's Notorious Record
East Valley Tribune - Reasonable Doubt Series
Washington Post - US Police Chiefs Say Arizona Immigration Law Will Increase Crime
Americas Majority Foundation - Immigration and Wealth of States

Lawsuits Against AZ SB 1070 Seek to Maintain Clear Federal Responsibility for Immigration Law

As the evidence increasingly points to how local police and sheriffs enforcing immigration law undermines community policing and increases crime rates, it becomes even clearer why the nation has traditionally kept responsibility for enforcing immigration law in the hands of federal officials. But as PSN has detailed before, Arizona’s law, unprecedented in its scope if it is implemented, would land immigration enforcement (a federal responsibility) squarely in the hands of state government.

This blurring of immigration enforcement roles between federal and state officials has already been legally challenged by the U.S. Department of Justice and at least seven prominent national civil rights organizations, including the American Civil Liberties Union, the National Immigration Law Center, and the Mexican American Legal Defense and Education Fund. Both the U.S. Department of Justice and these civil rights groups have filed lawsuits against Arizona’s law which is scheduled to take effect on July 29 if a federal court does not impose an injunction.

Arizona's Law Undermines Federalism and Threatens Racial Profiling: SB 1070’s scope is unprecedented, misguided, and likely unconstitutional: the law not only makes it a crime to lack immigration status, but also allows state and local law enforcement to demand proof of citizenship or immigration status from anyone they believe has ‘reasonable suspicion’ of being undocumented. Apart from greenlighting racial profiling, Arizona’s approach is widely perceived by legal experts as unconstitutional because it requires the state to take on enforcing federal immigration law.

A federal judge heard arguments outlining seven civil rights groups’ opposition to Arizona’s anti-immigrant law on July 22. These groups are asking for a preliminary injunction to freeze implementation of the law, which is scheduled to go into effect on July 29^th.

The lawsuit’s central legal argument (one echoed by the US Department of Justice’s own lawsuit challenging SB 1070) is the law seeks to pre-empt the federal government’s jurisdiction over enforcing federal immigration law, and that it allows the state too much power to enforce immigration law. Finally, the groups’ lawsuit states that implementing the law would cause considerable harm to Arizona residents as a whole. State legislators, immigrant rights advocates, and responsible law enforcement professionals will be hoping the federal courts agree.

Resources:
Progressive States Network - Arizona and the Nation: A Failed State Versus Positive Approaches to Immigrant Integration
Progressive States Network - Arizona Jeopardizes its Economic Future As it Contemplates Passing Anti-Immigrant Law
National Immigration Law Center - NILC and Civil Rights Groups Ask Court to Block Implementation of Arizona Law
American Civil Liberties Union Immigrant Rights Project - Friendly House et.al vs. Halliday et. al: Arizona's Racial Profiling Law
Immigration Policy Center - The Impact of SB 1070: Usurping the Federal Government's Ability to Set Clear Enforcement Priorities
Immigration Policy Center - The Legal Challenges and Economic Realities of Arizona's SB 1070
Progressive States Network - Polling, The Arizona Law, and Majority Support for Comprehensive Immigration Reform
Progressive States Network - Press Call: State Legislators for Progressive Immigration Policy

Anti-Immigrant Amendments Fail in Massachusetts State Legislature

PSN — Thu, 01 Jul 2010 11:35:03 -0400

Yet another set of anti-immigrant proposals, this time offered as last-minute amendments to a Massachusetts state budget bill, failed to gain traction last week. Twenty-seven pages of draconian anti-immigrant amendments were reduced to text that simply re-states existing bars on undocumented residents applying for public benefits.

When originally approved on May 28^th, the amendment included a slew of anti-immigrant measures that sought to scapegoat undocumented immigrants and prohibit their access to work, shelter, education, and safety in the state. In response, the Student Immigrant Movement and other immigrant advocates organized the MassHope 2010 vigil outside of the State House to highlight the knee-jerk, anti-immigrant nature of the amendments. After 19 days of rallying, protesters celebrated victory.

Failed Anti-Immigrant Legislation Trend : This triumph of reason over politics means Massachusetts joins several other states where anti-immigrant policies have amounted to nothing more than flawed political opportunism and hot air.

Much of this noise emanates from states whose legislatures have already closed their 2010 sessions, making these promises to introduce legislation mirroring Arizona’s controversial recent immigration law, SB 1070, premature at best. Bills for the 2011 state legislative session will not be considered or voted upon for months, leaving their ultimate success or failure still unknown.
Several Governors, including Texas’ Rick Perry, have already declared their intention to veto broad anti-immigrant legislation based on Arizona’s heavily criticized SB 1070.
In other states such as Rhode Island, whose anti-immigrant bill was killed by the Speaker of the House of Representatives even before it received a hearing, support for anti-immigrant politics and rhetoric is simply not as broad as legislators may think.

As the White House attempts to revive efforts to overhaul federal immigration laws, public and voter support for comprehensive immigration reform remains strong. According to polls commissioned by the group America’s Voice, voters on either side of the partisan aisle want common-sense, federal immigration reform that reflects American values, welcomes immigrants and provides them a pathway to citizenship.

Resources:
Immigration Policy Center - The Legal Challenges and Economic Realities of Arizona's SB 1070
Progressive States Network - Arizona and the Nation: A Failing State Versus Positive Approaches to Immigrant Integration
Progressive States Network - Arizona “Copycat” Anti-Immigrant Bill Killed in Rhode Island Without Hearing
America’s Voice - Public Opinion on Immigration Reform

Rahul is a summer immigration policy intern at Progressive States Network and a Drum Major Institute Scholar.

Supreme Court 2009-2010: Pro-Corporate, But Continued Trend Towards Deferral to State Authority

Nathan Newman — Tue, 29 Jun 2010 11:26:57 -0400

Yesterday, the Supreme Court ended its term with a bang with a ruling in McDonald v. City of Chicago that state gun control regulations can be struck down by federal courts based on the Second Amendment. While the number and scale of blockbuster decisions was not so high this session, the singular impact of the Citizens United case earlier in the term unleashing unregulated corporate money on elections, combined with the dangerous implications of the Rent-A-Center, West v. Jackson arbitration decision, emphasizes the pro-corporate bias the Supreme Court has increasingly exercised in recent years.

As detailed below, other decisions on public university governance of student groups, property rights challenges to beach restoration programs and regulation of ballot initiative processes, did continue the trend in recent terms of the Supreme Court deferring to state authority in major cases. And criminal justice cases continued to be a mixed bag of protecting individual rights versus upholding state discretion.

Table of Contents:
- Citizens United and the Supreme Court’s Pro-Corporate Bias
- Supreme Court’s Deferral to State Authority
- Criminal Justice
- Conclusion

Citizens United and the Supreme Court’s Pro-Corporate Bias

There is little question that Citizens United will be one of the major cases that defines this year’s term—and in many ways will frame the legacy of the rise of Chief Justice John Roberts and Justice Samuel Alito whose presence on the court has led to the dismemberment of campaign finance regulation.

"A Massive New Threat of Corruption and Corporate Control": With Citizens United, the Supreme court has given corporations the same free speech rights as individuals and allowed unlimited election spending by corporations when not coordinated with candidates.

U.S. Senator Sheldon Whitehouse of Rhode Island said recently,

The Citizens United decision -- yet another 5-4 decision [opens] our democratic system to a massive new threat of corruption and corporate control. There is an unmistakable pattern. For all the talk of umpires and balls and strikes at the Supreme Court, the strike zone for corporations gets better every day.

To emphasize its hostility to restrictions on the power of the wealthy over our elections, the Supreme Court ordered a freeze of Arizona's public financing matching funds system which gives candidates participating in public financing additional funds when opponents spend above benchmarked levels of spending. This means that publicly-financed candidates will be eligible to receive only one-third of the money to which they'd otherwise be entitled.

Letting Corporate Arbitrators Decide if Their Own Decisions are Unfair: In Rent-A-Center, West v. Jackson, the Supreme Court - by the same pro-corporate 5-4 vote lineup of Justices - further closed the courthouse door for individuals abused by their employers. The Court held that employees cannot only be forced to have complaints about racial discrimination or other employer abuses decided by private arbitrators (a reality decided in previous terms), but also that where an employee feels the terms of the arbitration agreement are unfair and unconscionable, it is up to the corporate-chosen arbitrator to decide if the arbitration agreement is unfair. In this case, for example, the arbitration agreement limited claims an employee might bring against the employer, while exempting those claims that Rent-a-Center might raise, and restricted an employee’s ability to gather evidence.

Instead of allowing a judge to decide whether the agreement to arbitrate could be enforced, the Supreme Court majority leaves it to the arbitrator chosen by the agreement alleged to be unfair to decide the issue, cutting off access to the courts even for the most basic threshold issue of whether these arbitrators and the rules imposed are a fair substitute for a day in court.

Privatizing Democracy: So just as corporations now have unlimited rein to use their money without regulation to dominate elections, those same corporations now have de facto have authority to run private courts to decide the legal rights of their own employees without little or no judicial restraint.

Supreme Court’s Deferral to State Authority

However, beyond these pro-corporate decisions, the Supreme Court, often with surprising configurations of majorities, continued its trend in recent years of deferral to state authority in more cases where core corporate interests are not at stake.

States and the Second Amendment: The exception to the trend this year was McDonald v. City of Chicago, which extended the Second Amendment to restrict state gun regulations. But even in that case, the majority went out of its way to affirm that many traditional gun control regulations will still be upheld even where an individual right to keep firearms for self-defense in the home is protected. Since most states have their own constitutional and statutory reasonableness test for gun regulations, the practical effects of McDonald may end up being relatively limited.

Rejecting “Takings” Doctrine: While right-wing constitutional lawyers for years hoped to create a majority to limit most local government land regulations as illegal “takings” under the Constitution, the Court in Stop the Beach Renourishment v. Florida Department of Environmental Protection not only rejected a property rights challenge to a state beach-erosion statute, but Justice Anthony Kennedy refused to even give a fifth vote to the proposition that a court ruling could ever constitute a “taking” of private property, a sign that most reasonable land use regulations will be protected from federal judicial second-guessing in the future.

Universities and Groups Excluding Gay Students: In Christian Legal Society v. Martinez, state universities retained their authority to deny funding to student groups that exclude certain students, such as gay and lesbian students, from membership. The Court upheld the University of California-Hastings' policy of requiring student groups to take on "all comers" as a prerequisite to official school recognition as a reasonable and viewpoint neutral restriction.

Public Disclosure of Ballot Initiative Signers: Given increasing use of fraud by those promoting right-wing ballot initiatives, progressives won an important victory in Doe v. Reed, in which the Court held that disclosure of signers of political ballot initiatives did not generally violate the First Amendment (although they might be able to in the future argue that specific harms could lead to some restriction on disclosure in a future case). In a strong argument for respecting state regulation of ballot initiatives, Justices Sotomayor, Stevens and Ginsburg wrote:

These mechanisms of direct democracy are not compelled by the Federal Constitution. It is instead up to the people of each State, acting in their sovereign capacity, to decide whether and how to permit legislation by popular action. States enjoy “considerable leeway” to choose the subjects that are eligible for placement on the ballot and to specify the requirements for obtaining ballot access (e.g., the number of signatures required, the time for submission, and the method of verification).

Reviewing Public Employee Text Messages: In a slightly idiosyncratic case, the Court in City of Ontario v. Quon unanimously held that a police department’s decision to review the text messages of employees who exceeded the monthly limit on their office pagers in order to determine whether the monthly limit should be raised was reasonable under the Fourth Amendment.

Criminal Justice

Criminal justice decisions by the Supreme Court invariably combine a combination of invocation of individual rights, discussions of state authority and obscure procedural explorations. While cases this term had few singular disruptions of previous principles, they had a number of clear incremental changes effecting state criminal proceedings. (See this ACLU writeup for an extended list of additional cases).

State Convictions and Immigration: Of import for current debates on the role of states in immigration policy, the court ruled in two cases that courts had to carefully weigh how state criminal statutes interact with federal deportation rules:

In Padilla v. Kentucky, the Court held that attorneys have an obligation to carefully advise their clients of the immigration consequences of pleading guilty. In this case, the defendant– a lawful permanent resident for 40 years who pled guilty to drug trafficking – was incorrectly advised by his lawyer that he was unlikely to face deportation because of his long stay in the United States.
In Carchuri-Rosendo v. Holder, a unanimous Court ruled that defendant’s conviction for possession of a single Xanax tablet without prescription, following an earlier state court conviction for possession of less than two ounces of marijuana, could not qualify as an aggravated felony under federal immigration law, and thus did not render the petitioner ineligible for potential discretionary relief from deportation.

Restricting Miranda: The Court significantly limited restrictions the Miranda “right to remain silent” in a series of cases limiting the Miranda ruling:

In the most critical case, in Berghuis, Warden v . Thompkins, a 5-4 decision of the Supreme Court affirmed that a suspect did not properly invoke his right to remain silent, so statements were properly admitted in court. Justice Sotomayor, writing for four dissenters said, “the Court today creates an unworkable and conflicting set of presumptions that will undermine Miranda’s goal.”
In Florida v. Powell, the Court held that police warnings that a suspect had a right “to talk to a lawyer before answering any questions” adequately complied with Miranda, since the right does not require a particular set of words for police compliance.
In a 6-3 Graham v. Florida decision authored by Justice Kennedy, the Supreme Court found a Florida law unconstitutional under the Cruel and Unusual Punishments Clause where juvenile offenders could be sentenced to life in prison without parole for a non-murder.
In Maryland v. Shatzer, the Court held that police did not violate the law by collecting incriminating statements from a person who had invoked his Miranda rights two and a half years earlier, and that the right against interrogation lasts only 14 days after invocation.

In other key decisions effecting state proceedings:

In Bobby v. Van Hook, Wong v. Belmontes and Porter v. McCollum, the court created a series of new standards for when counsel is so ineffective as to warrant a new trial.
In Presley v. Georgia, the Court concluded that a defendant’s Sixth Amendment right to a public trial had been violated when the public was excluded from the jury voir dire proceedings.
In Holland v. Florida, a 7-2 decision authored by Justice Breyer, the Court agreed that an attorney could harm his client so badly that the defendant’s time to seek habeas must be extended.

Conclusion

Elana Kagan’s likely replacement of Justice Stevens on the Court is unlikely to change the broader trends on the Court and states will continue to face the challenge of reining in the corporate election spending unleashed by Citizens United and protecting access to justice in the courts eroded by the Rent-a-Center case. As People for the American Way wrote in a recent report, Rise of the Corporate Court: How the Supreme Court is Putting Businesses First, “the conservative-tilting Court has reached out to enshrine and elevate the power of business corporations.”

While deferral to state authority has emerged as an increasing consensus among the Justices on a number of issues, lurking in the dissents of the most conservative Justices are even more extreme pro-corporate and right-wing views that with one more ally could push legal doctrine in ways that would completely erode democratic decision-making over economic and social policy. So even the more positive trends on the Court warrant only partial relief, since small changes in personnel in the future could readily enable the more activist impulses of the block of the four most right-wing members of the Court.

Resources:
Progressive States Network - The Supreme Court and the States 2008-2009: Trend Defending State Authority Emerges this Term
Scotusblog - Everything you read about the Supreme Court is wrong
ACLU - ACLU Summary of the 2009 Supreme Court Term
People for the American Way - Rise of the Corporate Court: How the Supreme Court is Putting Businesses First
Alliance for Justice - The Corporate Court

Alternatives to Incarceration Can Save Millions for Cash-Strapped States

Cristina Francisco-McGuire — Mon, 21 Jun 2010 13:25:36 -0400

With the highest incarceration rate in the world, in 2008 the U.S. puts one out of every 48 working-age men behind bars and spent $75 billion on corrections, the majority of which was spent on incarceration. To make matters worse, a new study released by the Center for Economic and Policy Research (CEPR) found that the $40 billion jump in state spending on corrections between 1988 and 2008 outpaced nearly every other state budget item, painting a bleak picture of incarceration in the U.S. and the resulting budgetary strain on the states.

As this Dispatch will outline, U.S. incarceration rates have far outpaced the growth in the population as a result of inflexible policies from "truth in sentencing" to mandatory minimum laws. These statutes crowd prisons with non-violent offenders and prevent probation and parole from being used to reduce ballooning prison budgets.

Partly due to recognition that filling prisons with non-violent offenders is a waste of human potential and partly because of the current budget crisis, states are beginning to reform their prison and sentencing policies to reduce bloated incarceration rates. Some states are engaging in emergency cuts in prison populations while others are more systematically cutting back or eliminating entirely the mandatory minimum and other rigid sentencing rules that fill prisons in the first place.

States are also directing some of the funds that will be saved from lower incarceration rates to helping ex-felons integrate back into the communities which they will be returning after prison. Such reentry programs recognize that investing in communities can replace the costs of incarceration with jobs and productive activity that actually generate economic development, tax revenues and a safer environment for all residents.

Table of Contents:

- The Costs of Exploding Incarceration Rates

- States Taking Action to Combat Bloated Incarceration Costs

- Improving Community Corrections Systems to Reduce Prison Populations

- Justice Reinvestment to Reduce Recidivism Rates

- Conclusion

The Costs of Exploding Incarceration Rates

The U.S. has the highest incarceration rates among comparable developed nations around the world, and incarcerates more people than any nation in the world. The U.S. has 753 of every 100,000 people in prison or jail, which is more than ten times the rate that Japan incarcerates their population (63 per 100,000) and seven times the rate of countries like Germany (90 per 100,000), Italy (92 per 100,000), France (96 per 100,000), or Canada just to the North (116 per 100,000).

Incarceration rates have skyrocketed – by more than 240% since 1980, as the study documents, yet the total number of violent crimes was only about 3% higher in 2008 than it was in 1980, while the total number of property crimes actually decreased by 20%. Incarceration rates have even outpaced the U.S. population, which only increased by 33% during that time period.

Rather than incarceration rates being driven by higher crime, they have instead been driven by rigid "tough on crime" policy decisions, including three-strikes laws, truth in sentencing laws, and mandatory minimums, which have led to an increase in non-violent offenses being treated as harshly as violent crimes. Coupled with an ideological move away from probation and parole in the criminal justice system, convicted criminals today are much more likely than in the past to be sentenced to prison instead of probation, and to serve longer terms with less chance of being released on parole. As a result, non-violent offenders comprise over 60% of the prison and jail population.

Resources
Center for Economic and Policy Research - The High Budgetary Cost of Incarceration

States Taking Action to Combat Bloated Incarceration Costs

Simply reducing the incarceration rate of non-violent offenders by 50%, which would return the U.S. to 1993's already-high incarceration rate, would save states $16.9 billion per year without any appreciable deterioration in public safety. This savings – which amounts to a quarter of annual corrections budgets in the states – would allow state and local governments to avoid cuts to necessary social services, education, and other programs that are being squeezed by the current fiscal crisis.

Some states are desperately engaging in emergency measures to cut their prison populations to save money. Last year, California passed a prison reform plan that would reduce the state’s prison population by 27,000 and save $1 billion. It still stops short of the $1.2 billion in cuts mandated by the state budget agreement - not to mention a court order that California reduce its prison population by 43,000 inmates - but it is a step in the right direction.

Repealing Mandatory Minimums: A more effective way to dramatically reduce the incarceration rate of non-violent offenders, both in California and elsewhere, would be to repeal mandatory minimums and other misguided "tough on crime policies." What was originally intended to be a deterrent for crime has actually had little to negative effect on public safety, while adding to mounting state costs. But repealing mandatory minimums would restore judicial discretion and allow judges to tailor sentences on a case-by-case basis. Not only are costly prison terms avoided by sending drug offenders and addicts to appropriate treatment programs, but sentences are more effective - the Rand Corporation has famously calculated that one dollar spent on drug treatment reduces crime related to cocaine use as much as 15 dollars spent on criminal justice responses.

New York and Rhode Island repealed their mandatory minimum for drug offenders in 2009, while Michigan is building on its successful campaigns in 1998 and 2002 that resulted in the most sweeping overhaul of mandatory sentencing laws. More than a dozen states, including New Jersey and South Carolina, have also followed suit and significantly narrowed their mandatory sentencing laws, and other states - most notably, Massachusetts and Pennsylvania - are taking first steps toward sensible sentencing laws. Delaware and Ohio, among other states, debated the repeal of mandatory minimums this year.

Expanding Earned Time Credits: Many states have expanded their "earned-time credits" programs, in which prisoners can shave off as much as 30% of their prison sentences by finishing educational courses, working, or any other experience that improves life behind bars. In Oregon, 950 prisoners had already been released 55 days ahead of schedule before state lawmakers suspended the program until 2011 due to political backlash. Though public outcry has focused on the effect such programs have on crime rates, a review by the National Council on Crime and Delinquency found unchanged or lower recidivism rates among prisoners who benefited from accelerated-release programs in states including Illinois, Wisconsin and Florida. California, Colorado, Illinois, Kentucky, Michigan, and Wisconsin are just some of the states that have already accelerated prison releases or are considering measures to do so.

Resources
Rand Corporation - Controlling Cocaine: Supply Versus Demand Programs
The National Council on Crime and Delinquency - Accelerated Release: A Literature Review
Families Against Mandatory Minimums
The Pew Center on the States

Improving Community Corrections Systems to Reduce Prison Populations

Once prisoners are on probation or parole, improvements in community corrections systems are also promising ways in which to relieve some of the burden of prison budgets:

Virginia assesses felony theft, fraud, and drug offenders who would otherwise be sentenced to prison under the state's sentencing guidelines, and sends those deemed low-risk into community corrections.
Georgia has implemented a program called Probation Options Management that allows probation officers to impose administrative sanctions themselves, instead of going through the time-consuming, expensive court system.
Early studies of Hawaii's Opportunity Probation with Enforcement (HOPE) show that participants were less than half as likely to test positive for drugs, while arrest rates were three times lower.
After Kansas implemented graduated sanctions and other improvements to its community corrections, the state cut parole revocations by half in two years and cut the percentage of parolees committing new crimes by a large number as well. Prison admissions of parolees for rule violations and new crimes, as well as parole absconding rates, are at or near all-time lows.
Arizona passed SB 1476 in 2008, which created performance incentives for both offenders and the county-based probation supervision system. When offenders abide by the rules of their parole, they can get up to 20 days taken off the probationary period.

Resources
The Pew Center on the States, One in 31: The Long Reach of American Corrections

Justice Reinvestment to Reduce Recidivism Rates

Finally, states can also go one step further and implement basic reforms to ensure a common-sense criminal justice system that will address recidivism rates and other barriers to a productive, crime-free life. Justice reinvestment, in which savings are directed into the communities where the largest proportion of offenders will be returning after prison, is a smart way to increase public safety while also reducing spending on corrections.

Many states are enacting a myriad of these strategies to great success:

Michigan has reduced its prison population by about 8% between March 2007 and November 2009 by adopting the Michigan Prisoner ReEntry Initiative (MPRI), which better connects prison system efforts for re-entry into society with locally developed re-entry support programs. The drop in Michigan’s prison population has allowed the state – which faces a budget gap of $1.4 billion – to close eight prison facilities for a projected savings of $120 million.
With nearly unanimous support in the legislature, Connecticut enacted laws that streamline the parole process for low-risk offenders, address the high rate of probation violations, and develop a strategy to reduce recidivism. After investing $13 million of the $30 million saved in community-based pilot projects, Connecticut saw its probation violations drop in half over a two-year period.
Faced with a projected increase in the prison population of 22% that would cost nearly $500 million over ten years, Kansas will instead save $80.2 million over five years after approving sensible criminal justice legislation.
A 2008 Rhode Island law allows inmates serving more than a month (except sex offenders and those serving life sentences) to earn up to ten days off their sentence for each month of good behavior, plus five more for joining a treatment program. Prisoners serving three to six months saw a 15% reduction in the average stay, while those serving six to nine months and five to seven years saw a decrease in the length of stay by 10%.
After enacting a criminal justice package in 2007 that expanded treatment and diversion programs as well as enhanced community-based parole and probation policies, Texas has empty prison beds – about 2,000 of them – for the first time in years. With a prison system roughly the size of the entire federal prison system, the state had incarcerated 5,500 repeat DWI offenders, over 50,000 drug offenders who were mainly non-violent or first-time offenders, and large numbers of mentally ill offenders prior to reform. Their new strategy resulted in immediate savings of $210.5 million for FY 2008 and 2009.
Property and drug offenders accounted for over half of the increase in the felony prison population in Vermont between 2000 and 2006. A recently enacted law establishes assessment processes prior to sentencing to determine who would be better served by treatment programs and expanded transitional housing and job training programs, which will save Vermont $54 million between FY 2009 and FY 2018.

Arizona, Nevada, New Hampshire, North Carolina, Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin are all working with the Council of State Governments to develop smart justice reinvestment strategies.

Resources
Justice Reinvestment, a project of the Council of State Governments Justice Center

Conclusion

Instead of cutting vital social services, states should instead look to reforming prison sentencing laws that are both unsustainable and ineffective. Many states are already saving millions of dollars by implementing much-needed reforms, realizing that both budgets and public safety can benefit from alternatives to incarceration.

Arizona "Copycat" Anti-Immigrant Bill Killed in Rhode Island Without a Hearing

Suman Raghunathan — Thu, 27 May 2010 11:26:44 -0400

Immigrant and workers' rights advocates celebrated a victory in Rhode Island this week with the announcement that State Rep. Peter Palumbo's anti-immigrant bill, closely based on Arizona's widely criticized SB 1070, would not get a hearing. Palumbo, a conservative Democrat from Cranston, a community with many immigrant residents, was planning on holding a hearing on his bill this week. Rhode Island was the fourth state to introduce legislation based upon Arizona's anti-immigrant SB 1070 , the nation's most sweeping anti-immigrant law to date, which Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer signed at the end of April. Legislators in 18 states have announced they will introduce anti-immigrant legislation similar to the recently-passed law in Arizona, but introduction does not guarantee passage or committee consideration. Few states are likely to pass such a bill this year as most legislatures have already adjourned, and will reconvene in early 2011.

Rhode Island House Speaker Gordon Fox came out in opposition to Palumbo's bill, and decided to table it -- the proposal was drafted roughly ten days ago, just before the end of the state's legislative session. Fox noted enforcing immigration laws is a federal matter, and his announcement late Monday night came on the heels of large community mobilizations on the House of Representative floor against Palumbo and his bill. Though Fox denied his decision was informed by immigrant advocates mobilizing against the bill, his decision does seem linked to widespread protests against the bill.

As we explained in greater detail in previous Dispatches, Arizona's recent and misguided anti-immigrant law actively encourages racial profiling by requiring all state and local police officers to demand proof of immigration status from anyone they feel exhibits 'reasonable suspicion' of being undocumented. SB 1070 also makes it state crime to not have proof of legal immigration status at hand at all times.

Resources:
Immigration Policy Center: The Legal Challenges and Economic Realities of Arizona's SB 1070
Progressive States Network - Arizona and the Nation: A Failing State Versus Positive Approaches to Immigrant Integration
Progressive States Network - Arizona Risks Jeopardizing its Economic Future As it Contemplates Passing Anti-Immigrant Law

Private Prison Firm Exploiting Broken Immigration System

Suman Raghunathan — Thu, 27 May 2010 11:20:36 -0400

Who benefits from hyping criminal enforcement as the solution to the immigration issue?

As a Service and Employees International Union (SEIU) campaign highlights, one key player profiting off the nation's broken immigration system is the private prison firm, Corrections Corporation of America (CCA). CCA operates and profits significantly from private prisons across the country, many of which house immigrants in detention, a kind of legal limbo in which immigrants are imprisoned while their cases are being considered, or who are in the process of being deported. Roughly 40 percent of CCA's profits stem from operating jails that house immigrants. In fact, the corporation earned over $1.7 billion in revenue in 2009 alone -- much of it from contracts with the Department of Homeland Security's Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), the US Marshals Office, and the Federal Bureau of Prisons to cope with the influx of nonviolent immigrants in the nation's prison system. CCA has also been a long-time funder of the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) and member of its Private Sector Executive Committee, which advocates on behalf of CCA to push prison privatization as a model for states.

While most believe prisons are operated by state or federal governments, they are increasingly privatized. As the number of immigration prosecutions continue to skyrocket and comprehensive immigration reform languishes in Washington, DC, this makes the business of operating prisons all the more lucrative for private firms. According to the Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse (TRAC), immigration prosecutions reached record levels in federal fiscal year 2009. The Department of Homeland Security initiated 67,994 immigration prosecutions that year alone, a 459 percent increase from 2000 and a 973 percent increase from 1990.

Filling Up Prisons with Non-Violent Immigrants: In addition, federal immigration authorities are increasingly targeting nonviolent immigrants, whose only offense is attempting to unlawfully cross the border, via efforts such as Operation Streamline, which focuses on apprehending nonviolent border-crossers. According to a May 2010 study by the Warren Institute at the University of California, Berkeley Law School, projects such as Operation Streamline that focus on immigrants who haven't committed any crime in the US divert precious federal resources from apprehending drug cartels and human traffickers that frequently operate with impunity along stretches of the US-Mexico border and are responsible for much of the violence in the region. These record numbers of nonviolent immigrants are, in turn, filling jails and immigration detention centers to capacity: contributing to growing costs to states and higher profits for private prison companies like CCA.

The Failures of Prison Privatization: Both federal and state governments have utilized private firms to operate prisons, despite evidence of systematic failures. Privatization only exacerbates the challenges faced by states, communities, and families dealing with the broken immigration system. For example, the Florida Center for Fiscal and Economic Policy finds that there is no compelling evidence that prison privatization has led to savings, while the Private Corrections Institute analyzes several issues with privatization, which include “major riots, sex abuse scandals… improper billing by private prison companies… employment law violations, higher employer turnover rates, increased levels of prisoner-on-prisoner and prisoner-on-staff violence, lack of transparency and public accountability, and higher recidivism rates for inmates released from privately-operated prisons.”

When privatization involves prisons and detention centers, the profiteering comes at the expense of constitutional safeguards, democratic oversight, and public trust. In this case, it also undermines legislative efforts to promote progressive immigration reform. Lawmakers should take action to prevent such debacles from occurring by either halting failed privatization schemes. For example, Indiana Rep. Gail Riecken's introduced a bill to end privatization of social services in her state. Legislators can also consider requiring augmented transparency of state contracting, much like initiatives in Alabama, Hawaii, and Vermont.

Resources:
Immigration Policy Center - US Border Enforcement Prioritizes Non-Violent Migrants Over Dangerous Criminals
Immigration Policy Center - New Data on Federal Court Prosecutions Reveal Non-Violent Immigration Prosecutions Up
Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse - Immigration Prosecutions at Record Levels in FY 2009
Immigration Policy Center - Throwing Good Money After Bad: Immigration Enforcement Without Immigration Reform Doesn't Work
University of California, Berkeley Law School Warren Institute on Race, Ethnicity and Diversity - Assembly-Line Justice: A Review of Operation Streamline
Florida Center for Fiscal and Economic Policy – Are Florida’s Private Prisons Keeping Their Promise
Private Corrections Institute – Quick Facts About Prison Privatization
Private Corrections Institute – Report on Prison Privatization Plagued with Conflicts of Interest, Faulty Data, Political Connections
Progressive States Network - Privatization During an Economic Downturn: Still Inefficient and Problematic
OneAmerica - Voices from Detention: A Report on Human Rights Violations at the Northwest Detention Center in Tacoma Washington
AFSCME - Prison Privatization Resources

"Banning the Box": New CT Law to Stop Discrimination Against Ex-Prisoners Based Solely on their Criminal Record

Tim Judson — Mon, 10 May 2010 12:19:39 -0400

Last week, the Connecticut Senate unanimously voted to enact HB 5207, which prevents discrimination against ex-prisoners based solely on their criminal record. In March, the Connecticut House of Representatives also voted unanimously in favor of the bill. The new law will prohibit state government employers from inquiring into a job applicant’s criminal record until the applicant has been deemed qualified for the position. It will provide similar standards for those seeking state licenses and certifications for trades or vocations.

The so-called “Ban the Box” law is so named because it eliminates from state job application forms the question requiring job-seekers to put a check-mark in the box if they have ever been convicted of a crime. Nationally, about two-thirds of people released from prison are convicted and sent back to jail (“recidivating”) within three years. Studies show that stable employment soon after leaving prison can substantially reduce recidivism, and with it state and federal costs for incarceration, prosecution, and law enforcement. A 2004 Loyola University study of recidivism in Illinois found that, while the state’s overall recidivism rate was 54%, that rate declined substantially with employment - for ex-prisoners who found jobs for at least 30 days, only 24% went back to prison; for those who maintained employment for twelve consecutive months, the rate was only 8%.

The National Employment Law Project has a recent report highlighting new initiatives to reduce barriers to employment by ex-prisoners. The “Ban the Box” movement began in 2003 as a grassroots effort to improve reintegration of ex-prisoners and reduce recidivism, and has been gaining steam ever since. New Mexico (§ 28-2-3) enacted similar legislation earlier this year, as did Minnesota in 2009, with other “Ban the Box” bills introduced in California, Maryland, Nebraska, New Jersey, and Rhode Island this year. To date, twenty cities and counties and seven states (including Connecticut) have passed laws prohibiting discrimination based solely on criminal record. Most laws apply only to public employers, although some apply to state/municipal contractors (e.g., Indianapolis and Philadelphia) and/or private sector employers (Hawaii and Kansas).

Resources:
National Employment Law Project - New State Initiatives Adopt Model Hiring Policies Reducing Barriers to Employment of People with Criminal Records
Major U.S. Cities and Counties Adopt Hiring Policies to Remove Unfair Barriers to Employment of People with Criminal Records
All of Us or None
All of Us or None YouTube Video
Safer Foundation - Redemption in the Presence of Widespread Criminal Background Checks
Loyola University, Jodina Hicks in Corrections Today, October 2004. - Employment Upon Re-entry: Prison-Based Preparedness Leads to Community-Based Success
The Sentencing Project - Relief from the Collateral Consequences of a Criminal Conviction: A State-by-State Resource Guide
RI Future.org - "Ban The Box" Bill Introduced in RI
Tacoma Examiner - Ban the Box - Ex-Convict Job Seekers No Longer Required to Disclose Criminal Past
ABC News - “Nebraska May 'Ban the Box' on Employment Applications”

Stopping Bullying in Schools

Nora Ranney — Thu, 06 May 2010 12:32:41 -0400

The outcry following the suicides of two Massachusetts students, who killed themselves after being subjected to intense bullying in the past year, culminated in Gov. Deval Patrick signing anti-bullying legislation on May 3rd. The Massachusetts House and Senate passed the bill unanimously, following more than a decade of work by advocates. The law prohibits actions that cause emotional or physical harm to students, including taunting over the Internet. Faculty and students are required to have anti-bullying training and parents must be informed of incidents at school. School employees, including custodians and cafeteria workers, must report incidents of suspected bullying and principals must investigate each case.

Massachusetts now joins 42 other states with an anti-bullying bill, leaving Michigan, Wisconsin, North Dakota, South Dakota, Alabama, Hawaii (last introduced in 2009), Mississippi, and Montana yet to join them. Wisconsin's SB 154 is on Gov. Doyle’s desk and would require school boards to enact anti-bullying policies and implement procedures for investigating and disciplining incidences of bullying. A Michigan bill (HB 4580) is stalled in committee, but Gov. Granholm has stated she will sign the bill if it reaches her desk.

Protecting LGBT Youth: In Michigan, the sticking point, as with many other more recent state bills, is whether or not to give specific mention to LGBT youth. A compromise not pleasing to either side is in negotiations, tweaking the language to read, “[Bullying] is reasonably perceived to be motivated by animus or by actual or perceived characteristic.” The American Family Association of Michigan is lobbying hard to kill the bill. Similar socially conservative "family" organizations have fought anti-bullying bills in other states.

Studies have shown that LBGT youth are especially targeted for bullying. A 2007 report by the Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network (GLSEN) found that 9 out of 10 LGBT students (86.2%) experienced harassment at school in the past year, three-fifths (60.8%) felt unsafe at school because of their sexual orientation and about a third (32.7%) skipped a day of school in the past month because of feeling unsafe.

Advocates in Massachusetts were disappointed that LGBT youth were not specified as a class in need of protection in the bill just enacted there. On the other hand, North Carolina last year passed SB 526, requiring schools to adopt strong policies against bullying and harassment, including bullying based on sexual orientation and gender identity, despite a protracted and oftentimes mean-spirited fight. This was the first time the terms "sexual orientation" and "gender identity" appear in the North Carolina General Statutes -- a significant victory for Equality North Carolina, which joined forces with a statewide school violence prevention coalition and other allies to support the bill, sponsored by Rep. Rick Glazier.

Upgrading Old Statutes: Many states with existing anti-bullying legislation are experiencing “upgrade” bills to include cyberbullying, training and/or to add “sexual orientation or gender identity” to the list of protected students. Cyberbullying -- defined as communicating harmful, violent and/or malicious words and/or pictures through the means of technology -- has been a growing area of harassment that states are increasingly seeking to address.

This legislative session, Illinois lawmakers passed an upgrade to their existing bill, now including LGBT students specifically and mandating tolerance training. The Senate bill passed with all but two senators supporting it; the House passed the bill unanimously. Gov. Quinn is expected to sign the bill within the week.

The key focus of all these anti-bullying laws is to hold school officials accountable for developing policies to prohibit bullying. Where they vary is in the details of bullying prevention programs, training for staff, and accountability measures to require individuals to report school bullying incidents. And regardless of the statute language, assuring they are interpreted and implemented appropriately is an ongoing challenge.

Resources:
Massachusetts: Comprehensive Anti-Bullying Bill Passes
Colorado: Colorado School Violence Prevention and Student Discipline Manual, Office of the Attorney General
New Jersey: Model Policy and Guidance for Prohibiting Harassment, New Jersey Department of Education
Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network (GLSEN): National School Climate Survey: Nearly 9 out of 10 LGBT Students Harassed
Human Rights Campaign: Statewide School Laws and Policies (Map)
National Institute on Mental Health: Anti-Bullying Resources

Arizona and the Nation: A Failing State Versus Positive Approaches to Immigrant Integration

Suman Raghunathan — Mon, 03 May 2010 14:33:14 -0400

As we highlighted two weeks ago, the Arizona legislature and Governor's decisions to pass a punitive, anti-immigrant bill - SB1070 - have unleashed a torrent of condemnations inside and outside of Arizona. Voices speaking up against the bill have come not only from civil rights organizations, but have also included public safety officials, constitutional legal scholars, and, significantly, Republican leaders and candidates from other states with significant immigrant populations.

While Arizona's extreme, draconian law is grabbing headlines, what's gotten less attention is how Arizona is an isolated case with increasingly anti-immigrant laws and policies advanced over the last few years. A handful of states have joined Arizona in its punitive approach to immigration, yet the often-ignored reality is that the vast majority of immigrants, including undocumented immigrants, live in states that have promoted far more humane and successful approaches emphasizing immigrant integration into local economies and communities.

As this Dispatch will detail, Arizona has blazed its own (misguided) path on immigration, which reflects dysfunctional right-wing politics that have driven the state into an economic disaster of low wages, mass-foreclosures and a punishing fiscal crisis. Grandstanding on race may be Arizona's substitute for grappling with its deep, systematic economic problems, but few other states have followed its lead in recent years, and even fewer seem likely to follow it on SB1070.

SB1070 highlights the need for more systematic campaigns to deepen immigrant integration policies in the states and for passage of federal comprehensive immigration reform to address the border and the need for legalization. The economic gains from positive reforms on immigration are too large to ignore at both the state and federal level.

We invite state legislators to join State Legislators for Progressive Immigration Policy (SLPIP) and other allies to sign up with PSN's State Immigration Project for updates on promoting progressive state immigration policy by emailing immigration@progressivestates.org.

Table of Contents:

- SB1070: Legalizing Racial Profiling, Violating Federalism

- Police, Civil Rights Groups and Republican Leaders Condemn SB1070

- SB1070: Symbol of Arizona's Failed Economy and Right-Wing Politics

- Arizona's Anti-Immigrant Politics Not the Norm for States with Immigrant Populations

- SB1070 Deepens the Need for Federal Comprehensive Immigration Reform

- The Economic Benefits of Legalization and Positive Immigration Integration Strategies

- Progressive Strategy to Address Immigration Policy

SB1070: Legalizing Racial Profiling, Violating Federalism

As we described two weeks ago, SB1070 is a radical anti-immigrant piece of legislation that will open the floodgates to racial profiling and abuses of civil liberties. The law will be challenged in court for both violating individual rights and being an illegal assertion of state authority given the federal government's primary responsibility for border and immigration matters. But in the meantime, the effects of its implementation will be sweeping, since the law:

Legalizes Racial Profiling: State and local government law enforcement officers are required to determine if a person is illegally in the United States based on a “reasonable suspicion,” an open ended approach that will encourage suspicions based on race. The law does little, if anything, to prohibit police officers from relying on race or ethnicity in deciding who to investigate.
Criminalizes immigration, which isn't a crime under federal law: Makes it a state crime to be in the country without legal status.
Undercuts Federalism: The law grants local police arrest authority for administrative violations of federal immigration law, even though the state police do not even have that authority under federal law.
Criminalizes Speech: The law criminalizes the solicitation of work even though courts have previously ruled that the solicitation of work is protected speech under the First Amendment.
Potentially Deters Enforcement of Other Laws: Since the law requires police officers responding to any city ordinance violation to automatically determine the immigration status of an individual they have reasonable suspicion of being an undocumented immigrant, many local violations won't be reported, consequently diverting law enforcement attention from violent crimes.

SB1070 Is a Product of a Racist, Anti-Immigrant National Network: The sweep of the law is hardly accidental, since it is the product of a national network of anti-immigrant groups tied to racist hate groups. As the Center for New Community noted in a recent email update:

[SB1070] was drafted by a lawyer for the legal arm of the Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR), whose founder has warned of a “Latin onslaught” and complained about Latinos’ alleged low “educability.” FAIR has accepted $1.2 million from the Pioneer Fund, a racist foundation that was set up by Nazi sympathizers to fund studies of eugenics, the science of selective breeding to produce a “better” race. The legislation was sponsored by state Senator Russell Pearce, who once e-mailed an anti-Semitic article from the neo-Nazi National Alliance website to supporters.

Kris Kobach, a Kansas law professor now running for Kansas Secretary of State, is the chief author of the bill, as emails recently revealed. Kobach was a top immigration advisor to John Ashcroft at the Justice Department who promoted national racial profiling of legal U.S. residents post-September 11th. He also drafted the local anti-immigrant ordinance for Hazelton, PA, which was struck down as unconstitutional by a federal judge in 2007.

With an eye on empowering allied groups like FAIR and related anti-immigrant groups, SB1070 is designed to allow them to sue local law enforcement agencies if they believe that are not adequately enforcing the new law, giving the right-wing new tools to control local police departments under threat of litigation.

Resources:
Progressive States Network - Arizona Risks Jeopardizing its Economic Future as it Contemplates Passing Anti-Immigrant Law
Center for American Progress - Fast Facts on Arizona’s Immigration Crack Down
Center for New Community - Fair Exposed, an online bi-weekly publication produced by the Center for New Community, a national civil rights organization. To subscribe email, fairexposed@newcomm.org.
Southern Poverty Law Center - Arizona Immigration Law Violates Constitution, Guarantees Racial Profiling
Wonk Room - The Group Behind The Harshest Immigration Bill In America
TalkingPointsMemo - AZ Immigration Bill Writer's Resume: GOP Activist, Ashcroft Aide, Arpaio Ally
The Rachel Maddow Show - Against Racial Profiling, Except When They're For It, Immigration Group President Addresses Racism Accusations, To Be FAIR: Following Dan Stein, Correcting the Record

Police, Civil Rights Groups and Republican Leaders Condemn SB1070

Unsurprisingly, a wide range of civil rights, labor, community and immigrant rights organizations within Arizona and the nation have condemned the law. The opposition to the bill has extended to law enforcement officers, legal experts and even Republican leaders in other states with large immigrant populations.

Former Florida Governor Jeb Bush noted, "I think it creates unintended consequences. It's difficult for me to imagine how you're going to enforce this law. It places a significant burden on local law enforcement and you have civil liberties issues that are significant as well." Even Republican strategist Karl Rove echoed, "I think there is going to be some constitutional problems with the bill. I wished they hadn't passed it, in a way."

Within Arizona, it is notable that the Arizona Association of Chiefs of Police has opposed the law on both fiscal and public safety grounds, since they worry that fear of government officials by immigrant populations will diminish the public’s willingness to cooperate with police in criminal investigations and will “negatively affect the ability of law enforcement agencies across the state to fulfill their many responsibilities in a timely manner.”

The President of the American Bar Association in a statement said, "It is, quite simply put, a law based on prejudice and fear, one whose purpose is to be divisive. This law encourages second-class treatment of individuals based on the color of their skin, and that is unacceptable."

Most telling for how out of step Arizona leaders have been are statements by Republican state leaders from states with large immigrant populations:

California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger believes Arizona's approach is "as unconscionable as it is unconstitutional," and vowed to pull California's state pension funds invested in Arizona.
Florida Senatorial candidate, former Florida Speaker of the House and Tea Party darling Marco Rubio warned SB1070 will create a police state: "From what I have read in news reports, I do have concerns about this legislation... I think aspects of the law, especially that dealing with 'reasonable suspicion,' are going to put our law enforcement officers in an incredibly difficult position." He later told reporters, "That's not really something that Americans are comfortable with, the notion of a police state."
Texas Governor Rick Perry said in a statement that "some aspects of the law turn law enforcement officers into immigration officials by requiring them to determine immigration status during any lawful contact with a suspected alien, taking them away from their existing law enforcement duties, which are critical to keeping citizens safe." Perry's views parallel those of his corporate supporters, like the president of the right-wing Texas Association of Business, who recently called Arizona's law "blatantly unconstitutional," saying there was "little likelihood the Texas Legislature would pass anything so misguided as what they've done in Arizona."

When conservative stars like Marco Rubio and Rick Perry think a law is too extreme, it's clear Arizona's leaders have moved into their own corner of anti-immigrant extremism.

SB1070: Symbol of Arizona's Failed Economy and Right-Wing Politics

Click for larger image online.

If other state leaders, even conservative ones from border states like Texas, are not rushing to copy SB1070, it's because whatever their partisan politics, they don't share the peculiar brand of pathological right-wing politics and the hollow economy that has left Arizona such a political and economic basket case.

Other states have grappled with a range of programs to reform their economies and budgets during the current economic crisis. That Arizona's claim to fame in this crisis is immigrant bashing in the form of SB1070 is symbolic of years, even decades of failed political and economic policies. That Arizona politics has promoted low-wage jobs that have left state residents with falling individual incomes relative to the rest of the nation and conditions for the state's children that rank at the bottom of the nation. Since the current economic recession began in December 2007, Arizona has lost 265,000 jobs, or 9.9 percent of the state's employment. And with little else to offer the unemployed, scapegoating immigrants has become a substitute in Arizona for having a real solution to solving the economic needs of its residents.

Individual Incomes Fall Behind the Nation: For decades, Arizona's average wages and income have been falling behind other states. A University of Arizona business school study from 2005 noted that "over the long term, the real income of the average Arizonan has lagged behind the rest of the nation... Arizona slipped from 94 percent of the U.S. level in 1970 to 86 percent in 2003." While the bubble economy in the state of the mid-decade gave a slight bump to individual incomes in the state, per capita income fell 4 percent from 2008 to 2009 after having been stagnant for the previous two years, the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis recently reported. Arizona was tied for fourth place with Idaho in having the highest drop in personal incomes per capita. Nationally, the decline last year was 2.6 percent.

An Economy Built on a Construction Bubble: The Urban Land Institute has referred to Phoenix as the "poster child" for the housing downturn and bad mortgages. The average price paid for office space in the Phoenix metro area tumbled more than 50 percent one year in 2009. Back in 2006, when growth peaked, about 30 percent of the Phoenix area’s economic output was tied to real estate and construction; subtract that bubble economic engine and even the nominal job growth in the state during the last decade collapsed into unemployment and foreclosures.

Part of the problem is that state leaders encouraged a low-wage, bubble-based economic strategy that added a mirage of job and population growth during the last decade, but left the state with poor fundamentals for long-term growth when the financial bubble collapsed nationally. Highlighting the weak economic underpinnings of the state economy, the Arizona Phoenix-Mesa-Scottsdale metropolitan area ranked near the bottom, 192nd of 200 metro areas, for growth in high-tech gross domestic product from 2003 through 2008, according to the Milken Institute.

Fiscal Solutions More Irresponsible Than Any in Nation: Arizona's fiscal crisis is considered one of the worst in the country by the Pew Center on the States. Since 1992, the state has approved 42 tax cuts to its three major revenue sources -- personal and corporate income, and sales -- and eliminated statewide property taxes that accrued to the general fund-- and despite promises of right-wing economic nirvana, the results have been low personal income growth and a generally low-level of resources for human needs.

Arizona has some of the highest foreclosure rates in the country, 18.9 percent of the state lacks health insurance and 276,500 Arizona children do not have coverage. In the most recent Annie E. Casey Foundation's annual "Kids Count" report, Arizona ranked 40th in the nation in child well-being, one of the worst in the nation for its teen birth rate (46th), high-school dropout rate (46th) and percentage of children not attending school and not working (44th).

But what truly distinguishes Arizona is its right-wing, inhumane and short-sighted approaches to addressing its current fiscal problems:

State leaders passed a law to abolish the state's KidCare program providing children's health care to 40,000 kids, the only state in the country to take such a step, and only reversed themselves when they discovered they would forfeit billions in federal dollars if they did so.
Wide-ranging cuts in programs across the state, from eliminating full-day kindergarten to cutting state employee salaries to removing 10,000 families from TANF cash assistance.
Two-thirds of Arizona state parks will be closed.

And this has been combined with a whole range of other right-wing and just plain kooky laws promoted by the Arizona's legislature.

SB1070 Will Make Arizona's Economic Problems Worse: Passing SB1070 will simply deepen the state's economic crisis. As the National Employment Law Project points out, smaller-scale anti-immigrant ordinances have cost individual localities millions of dollars. And other studies estimate SB1070 will further decimate Arizona's economy by driving immigrant families, undocumented and legal residents alike, from the state, further depressing demands for goods and already vacant housing tracts.

The Arizona Republic detailed, "More than 100,000 undocumented immigrants have left Arizona in the past two years because of the bad economy and earlier enforcement crackdowns. Now, a new wave of Latinos is preparing to leave."

"So, rather than massive deportations, we are basically going to encourage them to leave on their own," said State Rep. John Kavanagh, R-Fountain Hills, who is also a criminal-justice professor at Scottsdale Community College. But even he admits that the law will likely drive legal residents and their families out of the state.

The Texas-based Perryman Group found if all unauthorized immigrants were removed from Arizona, the state would lose $26.4 billion in economic activity, $11.7 billion in gross state product, and approximately 140,324 jobs.

Phoenix Mayor Phil Gordon and other local leaders anticipate a drop in new business creation in the state because of the new hostile environment. Phoenix Vice Mayor Michael Nowakowski observed: “We’re the laughing stock of the country because of these crazy laws.”

Resources:
Think Progress - Arizona Expands Its Discrimination: Teachers With Heavy Accents Can’t Teach English, Ethnic Studies Are Banned
Rogue Columnist - Arizona's Continuing Crisis and Kookocracy Watch
Arizona State University W.B. Carey School of Business - Jobs, Income, And Growth In Arizona: Individual Versus Aggregate Measures Of Economic Performance
Progressive States Network - Eye on the Right: Arizona's Failed Experiment with Tax Cuts

Arizona's Anti-Immigrant Politics Not the Norm for States with Immigrant Populations

Despite much media hype, most states with high concentrations of undocumented and legal immigrants have rejected the punitive approach of Arizona and a handful of like-minded states. Most states have quietly been moving forward with positive, integrative approaches to new immigrants in their communities.

As PSN detailed in a report in 2008 -- and the basic numbers have changed little since then -- only 11% of undocumented immigrants live in states that have enacted comprehensive punitive policies or sanctions in private workplaces against undocumented workers.

Most Undocumented Residents Live in States with Integration Policies: Instead, a significant majority of undocumented immigrants live in states with positive integrative or somewhat integrative policies. As detailed in a section below, with the right state policies, new immigrants bring new skills, business startups and economic growth-- and most states with experience with new immigrants have promoted policies to tap that economic growth potential.

Many states, including many of those where most undocumented immigrants live such as Texas and California, now provide in-state tuition (so-called DREAM Acts) for undocumented immigrants going to public universities. Others are promoting policies to integrate immigrants through English language instruction and assistance in navigating the citizenship process. A number of states such as Illinois and New York are providing health insurance to undocumented children. And instead of trying to punish immigrant workers, states are increasingly working with native and immigrant workers to crack down on bad employers who are violating minimum wage, safety and workers compensation laws.

In fact, over 50% of undocumented immigrants live in states that provide in-state tuition for undocumented immigrant children and nearly the same majority of undocumented immigrants live in states that are promoting "New Americans" policies to better educate new immigrants and nearly a majority also live in states that have recently enacted new penalties for wage law violations in order to raise wages for all workers, native and immigrant alike. See the chart for a comparison of the more pervasive positive approaches to immigration compared to the minority punitive approach.

The media largely rewards the tactics of political opportunists who to use the issue of immigration as a "wedge" issue, but ignore the political and economic success of other states in integrating new immigrants into their state economies and communities.

A State Agenda for Progressive Immigration Policy: As we highlighted in our Dispatch, State Immigration Policy to Promote National Change, there are a range of positive state policies that can improve the lives of immigrants and raise living standards and public safety for everyone, native and immigrant alike. These include:

Wage Law Enforcement as Immigration Policy - Redirect anger at lawlessness in the workplace toward employers who violate wage and other worker rights laws -- an approach that unites all workers, immigrant and native alike.
Immigrant Integration and Naturalization - Highlight policies that help all immigrants to better integrate into society, a broadly popular policy and one that also unites the interests of legal and undocumented immigrants.
Address Debate on Immigrants and Public Benefits - Emphasize the benefits to the public from providing education and preventive care to immigrants. Support resolutions that demand that the federal government, which receives billions in taxes paid by undocumented workers, share those revenues with states to expand services for communities with heavy immigrant populations.
Voting Reform versus "Voter ID" Attacks - Challenge the voter ID requirements that are disenfranchising many legal voters and support anti-voter intimidation policies. Support reforms like same day registration and vote-by-mail to assist citizens forced to overcome any new barriers to voting.
Community Policing and Immigrant Outreach for Public Safety - Support community policing policies that encourage immigrants to work closely with the police when they either see a crime or are victims themselves. Encourage community policing efforts involving undocumented immigrant communities.

Smart state policy proposals that emphasize the areas where the public is supportive of immigrant integration into our communities are both smart policy and smart politics. By better controlling the debate at the local and state level, progressives can help build support for federal reforms to regularize the legal status of undocumented immigrants and build a path to citizenship. Such strategies can isolate those who promote the scapegoating of immigrants and instead emphasize the issues that will benefit everyone, from wage law enforcement to integrating new immigrants into our local economies.

Resources:
Progressive States Network - State Immigration Policy to Promote National Change
Progressive States Network - The Anti-Immigrant Movement that Failed: Positive Integration Policies by States Still Far Outweigh Punitive Policies

SB1070 Deepens the Need for Federal Comprehensive Immigration Reform

If SB1070 accomplishes anything, it will be to focus national attention on why it is critical to revamp and improve federal immigration laws. Those on both sides of the partisan aisle overwhelmingly agree the nation's immigration system is broken, and long overdue for an update.

While federal law essentially decides who can legally enter the US and determines immigrants' eligibility for most services and benefits (according to federal immigration law, undocumented immigrants are ineligible for most public benefits apart from emergency room medical care), states have considerable jurisdiction over immigrants' access to some basic services and programs - such as, for example, New York state's decision to provide basic prenatal health care for women -- regardless of their immigration status -- as well as how state and local government (including law enforcement officers) interact with immigrant residents.

As noted above, most states have engaged immigration in a more positive manner: for example, several states (including Utah and Texas) extend in-state tuition rates to undocumented students who attend state universities and colleges. But given the given the federal vacuum on immigration, some states like Arizona will inevitably take matters into their own hands in a punitive direction.

The last comprehensive immigration reform, enacted in 1986 by Republican President Ronald Reagan, included a large-scale legalization program that allowed roughly 3 million undocumented immigrants to obtain legal status. Despite attempts at immigration reform in 2001, 2006, and 2007, there has been no significant change in the status quo of immigration policy since 1986. The longer the nation is forced to wait for federal immigration reform, the more states will make patchwork attempts to address immigration at the state level and the more opportunities there are for states to take misguided and economically disastrous approaches to immigration policy such as Arizona's.

Proposed Federal Reforms Promote Compromise Solution: The most recent proposal, unveiled by Senators Menendez, Reid, and Schumer, outlines a number of provisions to address the crisis:

On the negative side, it introduces a national identity card and takes a 'zero tolerance' approach with plans to continue to increase deportations of undocumented immigrants who are suspected of committing crimes; it also significantly ramps up militarization of the US-Mexico border.
However, the proposal also dramatically expands the channels for legal immigration into the US and provides an (albeit lengthy) path to legalization, and ultimately citizenship, for the roughly 11 million undocumented immigrants currently in the US. The proposal grants provisional legal status (which includes work authorization) to undocumented residents who come forward, register with the federal government, pay a fine, and commit to learning English. After eight years, if border enforcement and surveillance programs are successfully implemented, these individuals are then eligible for permanent resident status, and five years later are eligible to apply for US citizenship.
The Menendez-Reid-Schumer proposal also would grant permanent resident status (known as a 'green card') to every immigrant who earns an advanced degree from an American university, and would end country-based quotas on the number of H1B visas extended to highly-skilled workers who seek to enter the US.
Finally, the proposal would streamline the process for spouses and immediate relatives of those with green cards to enter the US themselves, addressing a backlog of family-based immigration that often requires family members to wait a decade before they can legally join their relatives in the US.

Resource: American Immigration Lawyers Association - Analysis of Senate Democrats Immigration Reform Proposal

The Economic Benefits of Legalization and Positive Immigration Integration Strategies

Several recent academic studies have underscored the economic benefits that a large-scale legalization program would bring to the US economy and households, despite the current flawed conventional wisdom that legalization would cause already-high unemployment rates to rise.

A study by Dr. Raul Hinojosa-Oveda of the University of California - Los Angeles uses the economic impact of the 1986 legalization program (one that also occurred during an economic recession with high unemployment) to forecast how a legalization program would affect the current economy. His analysis found a legalization program would yield at least $1.5 trillion in gross domestic product over a ten-year period. Legalization would allow undocumented workers to emerge from the underground economy, and would, as a result, raise not only their wages but those of their native-born counterparts, raising the wage floor for many workers. Increased wages would, in turn, fuel increased purchasing power and homeownership among newly-legalized immigrants, injecting billions, if not trillions, of dollars into the US economy as a whole.

Libertarians also echo the belief that immigrants, even those working in low-wage sectors, expand the American economy. According to this commentary analysis from the libertarian CATO Institute, "the addition of low-skilled immigrants expands the size of the overall economy, creating higher-wage openings for managers, craftsmen, accountants, and the like." Undocumented immigrants are typically low-income, but they are almost all employed. According to estimates by the Pew Hispanic Center, male undocumented immigrants, ages 18 to 64, had a labor-force participation rate in 2004 of an amazing 92 percent.

Other studies have found wage levels of low-wage immigrant workers increase by as much as 30 percent when they improve their English fluency by just one level, because they are able to advocate for themselves more effectively in the workplace - a powerful testimony to increasing state and federal funding for English as a Second Language classes.

Finally, federal, state, and local tax bases would benefit significantly from the increased earnings and purchasing power of newly-legalized immigrants. The Social Security Administration estimates that roughly 75% of undocumented immigrants pay payroll taxes. In fact, the Drum Major Institute notes that undocumented workers already are largely responsible for the future viability of the Social Security system with their $7 billion in annual tax contributions - most which they will never be able to access. And the President's Council of Economic Advisors found that US natives gain an estimated $37 billion annually from immigrants' economic contributions as a whole.

Resources:
Immigration Policy Center - The Fiscal Bottom Line on Immigration Reform
Immigration Policy Center - Assessing the Economic Impact of Immigration and the State and Local Level
Immigration Policy Center & UCLA: Raising the Floor for American Workers: The Economic Benefits of Comprehensive Immigration Reform
Immigration Policy Center - Immigration Reform as Economic Stimulus
Commentary Magazine - Higher Immigration, Lower Crime
Drum Major Institute - Principles for an Immigration Policy to Strengthen and Expand the American Middle Class
America's Voice - Immigrants to Tea Party Protesters: We'll Pay!
America's Voice - Facts at a Glance on Comprehensive Immigration Reform

Progressive Strategy to Address Immigration Policy

To defeat anti-immigrant attacks, the key for progressives is to proactively use smart policy campaigns to change the public debate on immigration both at the state and national level. Globalization is driving economic changes, including immigration, that cause fear and uncertainty for many voters, but if progressives promote economic and social policies that address the broader needs of working families and propose a vision of how to effectively integrate new immigrants into our communities, there is no sustained majority for punitive measures against undocumented immigrants.

Beyond individual policy options, advocates and elected leaders need to emphasize that the coalition in support of humane policies involving new immigrants is diverse and cuts into even many seemingly conservative communities. Elected leaders can build on traditional support from many African-American leaders to labor unions to forge alliances with forward-looking business leaders and religious leaders, including many evangelicals, who recognize that smart, humane immigration policies for our communities is a source of both moral and social strength.

Anti-Immigrant Conservatives Playing a Losing Game: And the dangerous reality for anti-immigrant conservatives is that they are playing a losing demographic game, with new legal immigrants voting in increasing numbers that will punish any party or ideological group that promotes racist approaches to the immigration issue -- one reason many Republican leaders are denouncing SB1070 so quickly.

There were 10 million Latino voters in 2008, an increase of 4 million since 2000. And a May 2009 poll of Latino voters found that 82% of Latino voters felt immigration was important to them and their families. Punitive approaches like SB1070 will inevitably impel a negative reaction, with nearly six-in-ten (57%) Latinos in a 2008 Pew Hispanic Center survey, saying they worried that they themselves or a friend or family member would be deported as a result of similar policies.

Conclusion: Humane immigration politics are also smart politics in the long-term, since the present coalition for progressive immigration policy is rapidly being joined by new citizens who are unlikely to forgive politicians who vote for racial profiling or other attacks on their communities. Ultimately, in an increasingly diverse nation, there is no long-term political future for politicians pushing these anti-immigrant laws. Elected officials who step up with intelligent, humane policies on immigration will both build a stronger economy and society in their states and win politically in the long-term.

Resources:
Progressive States Network -State Policymakers Need to Respond to Growing Clout of Latino Voters Nationwide
Pew Hispanic Center - Hispanics and Arizona’s New Immigration Law
America's Voice - The Power of the Latino Vote in the 2010 Elections: They Tipped Elections in 2008; Where Will They Be in 2010?

New State Laws Limit Reproductive Rights

Fabiola Carrion — Thu, 29 Apr 2010 12:17:41 -0400

Recent laws in Nebraska and Oklahoma highlight how a number of right-wing state leaders are attacking women's reproductive freedom. These bills range from replacing the viability standard established by the U.S. Supreme Court, to forcing women to watch an ultrasound as their doctors explain the status of the fetus, to precluding women from suing their doctors if the latter misinforms women of the well-being of their fetuses.

Nebraska's Unconstitutional "Fetal Pain" Law: Earlier this month, Nebraska enacted LB 1103, which changed existing law to define viability at 20 weeks on the unfounded theory that a fetus, by that stage in pregnancy, has the capacity to feel pain. Nebraska’s law is the first in the nation to restrict abortions on this basis. Exceptions to this law only occur in the event of a medical emergency, the pregnant woman’s imminent death, or a serious risk of "substantial and irreversible physical impairment of a major bodily function": a provision experts interpret as an effort to exclude an exception based on a woman’s mental health.

National advocacy organizations such as the Center for Reproductive Rights have vociferously expressed their opposition to the Nebraska law, which will likely set off a constitutional challenge before the United States Supreme Court, since the standards set in LB 1103 are based on the assertion that fetuses feel pain, not on the ability of a fetus to survive outside of the womb, the legal standard established by the U.S. Supreme Court. Experts like the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists have noted that the question of pain felt by a fetus is an intense and unresolved debate among researchers and advocates on both sides of the abortion question.

In a letter to Republican Gov. Dave Heineman urging him to veto the bill, the Center for Reproductive Rights declared that LB 1103 was unconstitutionally vague, could prevent women from accessing essential reproductive health care, and threatens a woman’s constitutional right to choose to terminate her pregnancy. It would also require doctors to violate medical ethics and standards of care.

If LB 1103 did not cause enough harm to women’s health, another Nebraska law, LB 594, requires health care providers to screen women for at least one hour for possible physical or mental risk before they get an abortion. Another bill that is the first of its kind in the United States, LB 594, further restricts a woman’s constitutional right to get an abortion before viability.

Oklahoma: Just yesterday, Oklahoma's conservative Legislature voted to override Gov. Brad Henry's vetoes of two anti-reproductive health measures, even after the governor signed two other anti-choice bills.

Mandatory Ultrasounds: The first, HB 2780, will require women seeking to terminate a pregnancy to undergo a mandatory ultrasound as well as hear a detailed description of the development of the fetus. No exceptions are made for rape and incest victims. Although laws in other states require ultrasounds before an abortion, Oklahoma's new mandate becomes the strictest policy because the doctor would also have to describe the status of the fetus as the woman views the ultrasound image.
Allowing Doctors to Mislead Patients: A second law, HB 2656, prevents women who have a disabled baby from suing a doctor for withholding information about birth defects while the child was in the womb. This law will protect doctors who purposely mislead a woman to keep her from choosing an abortion.
Other Bills to Discourage Abortion: In addition, one law (HB 3075) was signed to require clinics to post signs stating that a woman cannot be forced to have an abortion, and another (HB 1595) makes it illegal to have an abortion because of the sex of a child. Two additional bills are working their way through the Oklahoma legislature: one would force women to fill out a lengthy questionnaire about their reasons for seeking an abortion and another restricts insurance coverage for abortion procedures. As Anita Fream, the chief executive of Planned Parenthood of Central Oklahoma elaborates, "These laws all have the same goal, and that's to discourage women from seeking abortions in the first place." With so many restrictions in place, Oklahoma is taking a shameful lead position in violating women's constitutional right to make choices about their reproductive health.

It is even more unfortunate that Nebraska and Oklahoma are not the only places that are seeking to limit women’s reproductive rights. A dozen other states are passing or debating new restrictions. Elizabeth Nash of the Guttmacher Institute, a research group focused on reproductive health and rights, observes, “This year, particularly in the past couple of weeks, it’s really turned into a free-for-all on trying to restrict abortions.” The Institute argues, "these measures are widely viewed as an attempt to provoke a legal challenge to Roe."

Rising Clash of Anti-Abortion Versus Pro-Choice State Policies: While the Guttmacher Institute details that 20 states have laws that could be used to restrict the legal status of abortion, they also identify seventeen states, including some of the largest like California, Illinois, and New York, which broadly fund abortions for women on Medicaid, reflecting the wide range of state approaches on the abortion issue. The fact that some states like Oklahoma and Nebraska are pushing such egregiously bad bills is a signal that other state leaders need to step up to protect and expand upon their own pro-choice approaches.

Resources:
The New York Times - Nebraska Law Sets Limits on Abortion
The Guttmacher Institute - State Policies in Brief:Abortion Policy in the Absence of Roe and An Overview of Abortion Laws
The Center for Reproductive Rights - The Center Responds to Nebraska’s Extreme Anti-Abortion Laws
Kaiser Health News - States Move To Require Ultrasounds Before Abortions
Pro-Choice of Oklahoma