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The Grand Canyon, as viewed from Mohave Point. NPS photo.
Are you rethinking that trip to the Grand Canyon or Saguaro National Park due to the approach Arizona officials are taking towards illegal immigration?
Arizona's move to require police to check anyone's U.S. residency status if it might be in doubt is drawing quite a bit of criticism. Already there's some evidence that folks from outside Arizona who oppose the law are canceling trips to the Grand Canyon State.
Are you?
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Comments
Again - a US citizen under this law is not required to carry any form of ID for walking down the street or being a passenger in a vehicle. No federal or state law makes IDs mandatory. If this law is enforced as written, I can almost guarantee that someone with legal status (including US citizens) in the country is going to be detained because that someone (who was never required to have any in the first place) didn't have ID. I'm not necessarily a fan of random checkpoints, but in those cases drivers are required to carry their licenses, and drug-sniffing dogs will simply do their thing and leave you alone when they realize there's nothing. Someone who doesn't have acceptable ID is going to be in for a long day under this law.
"Sir. Could I see your ID?"
"Sorry officer. I was just going to pick up my son from school. My car is in the shop, and I took the bus. I was in a hurry and I forgot to bring my wallet."
"I understand your dilemma, but I have to follow the law. I can take you home and you can produce your ID."
"Yeah - it's at home, but I need to pick up my son."
"Again - I understand, but the law requires that I determine your legal status before I can let you go."
"You couldn't give me an exception?"
"If it were up to me I would. However - the law says the public can sue us if we don't follow it to the letter. I'm sorry - I can't make an exception for you."
** ** **
I suppose the one thing they could have done would make it mandatory for EVERYONE to carry some form of ID that meets their standard for adjudicating legal status, with the same Class 1 misdemeanor penalty (up to 6 months in the pokey) for not doing so. However - they didn't mandate that, and I'm pretty sure there would have been some pretty stiff resistance to that.
The feds won't do a real crackdown on illegal immigration because that would mean hitting employers with hefty criminal and/or civil penalties, along with a loss of their trained workforce.
Some just don't get it. Citizens have long been hauled in by police for vagrancy if they had no money in their pocket or an I.D. This is overlooked by those who cry foul on this immigration enforcement. Yes you do have to have a license to be behind the wheel of a car. If you don't, you should be hauled in. Maybe the next time you would think before you got behind the wheel. Obay the law and have your freedom. Disobay the laws and loose your freedom. It truly is that simple.
Not me. I applaud the Arizona governor for taking the first step. The illegal immigration issue has ben ignored by both parties for too long.
As a supporter of the National Parks, I want citizens to feel safe when they travel in the parks. As it is now, Organ Pipe is a no go area for me. Too dangerous. I would be hesitant to do any tent camping in many of the national parks or monuments near the border.
This law will make Arizona and the surrounding states safer since Arizona is a leading corridor for human and drug trafficking to other states. The federal government has refused to complete the border fence. They don't enforce immigration laws. They don't reimburse the states for the costs of their non-enforcement. One-third of all inmates in California prisons are illegals.
I am now thinking of a visit to Arizona now in the fall. I wasn't before this whole brouhaha. For every person boycotting Arizona there are likely to be three like me.
[quote=Kath]One-third of all inmates in California prisons are illegals.
This surfaces quite a bit within the immigration debate and as far as I can tell stems from a statement made by a LA County Sheriff 10 years ago, "23% of inmates in county jails were deportable." and this includes all immigrants convicted of crimes, legal and illegal, from Mexico and all other countries. A 2007 report by the Immigration Policy Center said that among men 18-39, which represents the majority of prison inmates in California, the incarceration rate of foreign born was 0.7 percent while the incarceration rate of native born was 3.5 percent. The report does not say how many of the foreign born were illegals.
Here is another report from the IPC for your reading pleasure (.pdf file)
Shame on all of you.
This should be eye-opening for you, Kurt, these comments show the true colors of the majority of your readers.
When I serve them as an NPS employee, I keep my mouth shut about their racism and entitled approach to life, because I would lose my job if I didn't.
Shame on every last one of you for supporting what is a veiled first step towards Fascism in America.
This will be my last post to this site, and the last time I visit it. I have to put up with their inhumanity on the job, I cannot expose myself to any more of it here on NPT.
I'm certainly sorry you feel you can't continue to contribute, NPSfan, for we've long taken the stance here at the Traveler that only through civil discourse, discourse that offers a wide range of views, can folks come to perhaps understand an opposing point of view.
Can we succeed? Who knows. That's certainly a lofty goal. But I do believe if folks like you abandon the discussion that it's a great loss, for it lessens the diversity of opinions that can be learned from.
That said, I feel I'm on safe ground to say that most of the harsher comments do not come from our regular readers, but rather from a minority who aren't regulars. And looking back through the comments, I do see a lot of tolerance...as well as a lot of frustration.
NPSFan...
Speaking as another nonofficial visitor to this site, and one who is also quite pissed about the racism that has been growing in our nation not just in Arizona but nationally since the last Presidential election, I sure would encourage you to stick around here. I enjoy your posts and if everyone leaves then Kurt will be left only with the naysayers [most of whom I would guess won't stick around for other less controversial but equally important NPS issues].
[[ hmmm... Captcha phrase for me today is "Supreme shimmery"....]]