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The Ninth Circuit had ruled that Arizona had improperly preempted Federal immigration law.

(The Court will probably release its ObamaCare decision on Thursday.)

I am The Master and will enforce or ignore whatever laws I wish.

The Supreme Court today affirmed, in part, five to three (Kagan, J. not participating) the Ninth Circuit decision that Arizona had improperly preempted Federal immigration laws. As noted here,

Today’s decision leaves the most controversial provision of SB 1070 in place, which is the section empowering local police to inquire about immigration status. That is the section that . . . Georgia and Alabama and other states have emulated in their immigration laws. The sections struck down had to do with banning illegal aliens from seeking work, mandating immigrants to carry their visas with them at all times, and penalizing employers of illegal aliens. The court ruled that existing federal laws already deal with those issues. The vote to uphold Section 2B was 8-0 with Kagan recusing herself.

Arizona Governor Brewer

hailed the decision as a victory for supporters of tough immigration enforcement.

“Today’s decision by the U.S. Supreme Court is a victory for the rule of law. It is also a victory for the 10th Amendment and all Americans who believe in the inherent right and responsibility of states to defend their citizens,” Brewer said in written statement. “After more than two years of legal challenges, the heart of SB 1070 can now be implemented in accordance with the U.S. Constitution.” SB 1070 is the official name of the Arizona law.

The reasons for the Arizona immigration laws, which the Ninth Circuit in United States v. State of Arizona had held uniformly preempted by Federal immigration law, are well set forth in a concurring/dissenting opinion by Ninth Circuit Judge Bey. I wrote about it here, providing some pertinent quotes from Judge Bea.

The majority also finds that state officers reporting illegal aliens to federal officers, Arizona would interfere with ICE’s [U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement] “priorities and strategies.” It is only by speaking in such important-sounding abstractions — “priorities and strategies” — that such an argument can be made palatable to the unquestioning. How can simply informing federal authorities of the presence of an illegal alien, which represents the full extent of Section 2(B)’s limited scope of state-federal interaction, possibly interfere with federal priorities and strategies — unless such priorities and strategies are to avoid learning of the presence of illegal aliens? What would we say to a fire station which told its community not to report fires because such information would interfere with the fire station’s “priorities and strategies” for detecting and extinguishing fires?

…

The majority’s arguments regarding how any of the state officers’ actions spelled out in Section 2(B) could interfere with federal immigration enforcement is consistent with only one premise: the complaining federal authorities do not want to enforce the immigration laws regarding the presence of illegal aliens, and do not want any help from the state of Arizona that would pressure federal officers to have to enforce those immigration laws. With respect, regardless what may be the intent of the Executive, I cannot accept this premise as accurately expressing the intent of Congress. (Emphasis in original, internal citations omitted.)

Section 2(B) is not Federally preempted.

As the Supreme Court observed today, Section 2(B) of S.B. 1070

requires state officers to make a “reasonable attempt . . . to determine the immigration status” of any person they stop, detain, or arrest on some other legitimate basis if “reasonable suspicion exists that the person is an alien and is unlawfully present in the United States.” The law also provides that “[a]ny person who is arrested shall have the person’s immigration status determined before the person is released.” The accepted way to perform these status checks is to contact ICE, which maintains a database of immigration records. (I added the italic emphasis; internal citations omitted.)

Three limits are built into the state provision. First, a detainee is presumed not to be an alien unlawfully present in the United States if he or she provides a valid Arizona driver’s license or similar identification. Second, officers “may not consider race, color or national origin . . . except to the extent permitted by the United States [and] Arizona Constitution[s].” Third, the provisions must be “implemented in a manner consistent with federal law regulating immigration, protecting the civil rights of all persons and respecting the privileges and immunities of United States citizens.” (Internal citations omitted.)

After providing some guidance as to how Section 2(B) can be enforced to avoid Federal preemption (i.e., by adhering to the Arizona statute) the Court noted:

The nature and timing of this case counsel caution in evaluating the validity of §2(B). The Federal Government has brought suit against a sovereign State to challenge the provision even before the law has gone into effect. There is a basic uncertainty about what the law means and how it will be enforced. At this stage, without the benefit of a definitive interpretation from the state courts, it would be inappropriate to assume §2(B) will be construed in a way that creates a conflict with federal law. Cf. Fox v. Washington, 236 U. S. 273, 277 (1915) (“So far as statutes fairly may be construed in such a way as to avoid doubtful constitutional questions they should be so construed; and it is to be presumed that state laws will be construed in that way by the state courts” (citation omitted)). As a result, the United States cannot prevail in its current challenge. See Huron Portland Cement Co. v. Detroit, 362 U. S. 440, 446 (1960) (“To hold otherwise would be to ignore the teaching of this Court’s decisions which enjoin seeking out conflicts between state and federal regulation where none clearly exists”). This opinion does not foreclose other preemption and constitutional challenges to the law as interpreted and applied after it goes into effect.

The Supreme Court recognized Arizona’s abnormally bad illegal immigrant situation.

As the majority observed,

The pervasiveness of federal regulation does not diminish the importance of immigration policy to the States. Arizona bears many of the consequences of unlawful immigration. Hundreds of thousands of deportable aliens are apprehended in Arizona each year. Dept. of Homeland Security, Office of Immigration Statistics, 2010 Yearbook of Immigration Statistics 93 (2011) (Table 35). Unauthorized aliens who remain in the State comprise, by one estimate, almost six percent of the population. See Passel & Cohn, Pew Hispanic Center, U. S. Unauthorized Immigration Flows Are Down Sharply Since Mid-Decade 3(2010). And in the State’s most populous county, these aliens are reported to be responsible for a disproportionate share of serious crime. See, e.g., Camarota & Vaughan, Center for Immigration Studies, Immigration and Crime: Assessing a Conflicted Situation 16 (2009) (Table 3) (estimating that unauthorized aliens comprise 8.9% of the population and are responsible for 21.8% of the felonies in Maricopa County, which includes Phoenix).

Statistics alone do not capture the full extent of Arizona’s concerns. Accounts in the record suggest there is an“epidemic of crime, safety risks, serious property damage, and environmental problems” associated with the influx of illegal migration across private land near the Mexican border. Brief for Petitioners 6. Phoenix is a major city of the United States, yet signs along an interstate highway30 miles to the south warn the public to stay away. One reads, “DANGER—PUBLIC WARNING—TRAVEL NOT RECOMMENDED / Active Drug and Human Smuggling Area / Visitors May Encounter Armed Criminals and Smuggling Vehicles Traveling at High Rates of Speed.”App. 170; see also Brief for Petitioners 5–6. The problems posed to the State by illegal immigration must not be underestimated. These concerns are the background for the formal legal analysis that follows. The issue is whether, under preemption principles, federal law permits Arizona to implement the state-law provisions in dispute.

The fate of Section 2(B) can eventually be determined by (a) how the Arizona state courts construe it and/or (b) by challenges in Federal court to the manner in with it is hereafter applied.

Partial Dissents and Concurrences

Mr. Justice Scalia concurred as to Section 2(B) and dissented as to the remainder stating,

The United States is an indivisible “Union of sovereign States.” Today’s opinion, approving virtually all of the Ninth Circuit’s injunction against enforcement of the four challenged provisions of Arizona’s law, deprives States of what most would consider the defining characteristic of sovereignty: the power to exclude from the sovereign’s territory people who have no right to be there. Neither the Constitution itself nor even any law passed by Congress supports this result. I dissent. (Internal citations omitted.)

Section 5(C), rejected by the Court, provides,

It is unlawful for a person who is unlawfully present in the United States and who is an unauthorized alien to knowingly apply for work, solicit work in a public place or perform work as an employee or independent contractor in this state.

Justice Scalia disagreed with the Majority that for Arizona to enforce Section 5(c) would be inconsistent with the Federal power to allocate Federal resources,

The brief for the Government in this case asserted that “the Executive Branch’s ability to exercise discretion and set priorities is particularly important because of the need to allocate scarce enforcement resources wisely.” Of course there is no reason why the Federal Executive’s need to allocate its scarce enforcement resources should disable Arizona from devoting its resources to illegal immigration in Arizona that in its view the Federal Executive has given short shrift. Despite Congress’s prescription that “the immigration laws of the United States should be enforced vigorously and uniformly,” Arizona asserts without contradiction and with supporting citations:

“[I]n the last decade federal enforcement efforts have focused primarily on areas in California and Texas, leaving Arizona’s border to suffer from comparative neglect. The result has been the funneling of an increasing tide of illegal border crossings into Arizona. Indeed, over the past decade, over a third of the Nation’s illegal border crossings occurred in Arizona.”

Must Arizona’s ability to protect its borders yield to the reality that Congress has provided inadequate funding for federal enforcement—or, even worse, to the Executive’s unwise targeting of that funding? (Internal citations omitted.)

Justice Scalia also commented in that connection on the Obama Administration’s unilateral decision to implement its own nightmare dream act:

It has become clear that federal enforcement priorities—in the sense of priorities based on the need to allocate “scarce enforcement resources”—is not the problem here. After this case was argued and while it was under consideration, the Secretary of Homeland Security announced a program exempting from immigration enforcement some 1.4 million illegal immigrants under the age of 30. If an individual unlawfully present in the United States . . . [under specified conditions] then U. S. immigration officials have been directed to “defe[r] action” against such individual “for a period of two years, subject to renewal.”6 The husbanding of scarce enforcement resources can hardly be the justification for this, since the considerable administrative cost of conducting as many as 1.4 million background checks, and ruling on the biennial requests for dispensation that the nonenforcement program envisions, will necessarily be deducted from immigration enforcement. The President said at a news conference that the new program is “the right thing to do” in light of Congress’s failure to pass the Administration’s proposed revision of the Immigration Act.7 Perhaps it is, though Arizona may not think so. But to say, as the Court does, that Arizona contradicts federal law by enforcing applications of the Immigration Act that the President declines to enforce boggles the mind.

The Court opinion’s looming specter of inutterable horror—“[i]f §3 of the Arizona statute were valid, every State could give itself independent authority to prosecute federal registration violations,” ante, at 10—seems to me not so horrible and even less looming. But there has come to pass, and is with us today, the specter that Arizona and the States that support it predicted: A Federal Government that does not want to enforce the immigration laws as written, and leaves the States’ borders unprotected against immigrants whom those laws would exclude. So the issue is a stark one. Are the sovereign States at the mercy of the Federal Executive’s refusal to enforce the Nation’s immigration laws?

. . . .

As is often the case, discussion of the dry legalities that are the proper object of our attention suppresses the very human realities that gave rise to the suit. Arizona bears the brunt of the country’s illegal immigration problem. Its citizens feel themselves under siege by large numbers of illegal immigrants who invade their property, strain their social services, and even place their lives in jeopardy. Federal officials have been unable to remedy the problem,and indeed have recently shown that they are unwilling to do so. Thousands of Arizona’s estimated 400,000 illegal immigrants—including not just children but men and women under 30—are now assured immunity from enforcement, and will be able to compete openly with Arizona citizens for employment.

Arizona has moved to protect its sovereignty—not in contradiction of federal law, but in complete compliance with it. The laws under challenge here do not extend or revise federal immigration restrictions, but merely enforce those restrictions more effectively. If securing its territory in this fashion is not within the power of Arizona, we should cease referring to it as a sovereign State. I dissent. (Emphasis added, internal citations omitted.)

Justice Thomas in a separate opinion agreed with Justice Scalia. Justice Alito in his separate opinion agreed with the Majority as to Section 2(B) as had Justices Scalia and Tomas. He also agreed with the majority as to Section 3 (making failure to comply with federal alien registration requirements a state misdemeanor) but agreed with Justices Scalia and Thomas as to Sections 5(C) ( making it a misdemeanor for an unauthorized alien to seek or engage in work in the State) and 6 (authorizes officers to arrest without a warrant a person “the officer has probable cause to believe . . . has committed any public offense that makes the person removable from the United States).

As things now stand, Arizona can continue to enforce Section 2(B) and will presumably do so consistently with the caveats presented in the majority opinion. The remainder of her immigration statues are dead unless Congress acts explicitly to permit States to respond to their differing illegal immigration problems. The States need such Congressional action if they are to resume their proper place in our form of government.

I agree substantially with the separate opinions of Justices Scalia and Alito. The Congress gave the Executive Branch authority to enforce Federal immigration laws enacted by the Congress, not the discretion to refuse to enforce them for its own transitory political purposes as it has done.

UPDATE: President Obama has suspended agreements with the Arizona police and directed the Homeland InSecurity Department to ” to decline many of the calls reporting illegal immigrants that the Homeland Security Department may get from Arizona police.”

Administration officials, speaking on condition they not be named, told reporters they expect to see an increase in the number of calls they get from Arizona police — but that won’t change President Obama’s decision to limit whom the government actually tries to detain and deport.

“We will not be issuing detainers on individuals unless they clearly meet our defined priorities,” one official said in a telephone briefing.

The official said that despite the increased number of calls, which presumably means more illegal immigrants being reported, the Homeland Security Department is unlikely to detain a significantly higher number of people and won’t be boosting personnel to handle the new calls.

That’s a pretty how-DE-do. As noted here,

This is a political maneuver designed to punish Arizona, which is already reeling from the lawlessness on its border with Mexico. It also tells us that the administration has given up on winning Arizona, which until recently was considered a swing state, this fall. Obama has written it off, and is now going Soviet on it to make it an example to others. He is essentially kicking Arizona out of whatever is left of the federal government’s border enforcement, declaring to smugglers and traffickers that Arizona is very much on its own. The sucker punch comes when police enforce Section 2B of 1070 and get the state sued again. That’s likely to put the law back on hold, giving the green light to anyone who wants to sneak into Arizona from Mexico for any reason whatsoever.

Oh well. I guess that if President Obama can pick and choose what Federal laws to enforce he can decide which to obey as well.

First published at Dan Miller’s Blog.

The Executive Decision not to enforce Federal immigration laws
in order to give President Obama a badly needed political boost
may run afoul of the soon-to-be-released Supreme Court decision in the
Arizona Immigration Law case.

President Obama’s own Nightmare Dream Act

On June 15th, President Obama grandly announced that because the Congress had declined to pass a “Dream Act” granting immunity from prosecution to members of specific groups of illegal aliens, he had taken it upon himself to do it. Doing it just temporarily was fine for his purposes, because the election is less than five months away. Less than a year before, he had told a gathering of la Raza people about his unhappiness that he could not do what he just did, because of the laws and Constitution of the United States, which he had sworn to uphold, forbade him. Even so, he said that doing what he wanted to do was “very tempting.”

Having surrendered to political expediency temptation, President Obama on June 15th attempted to ensure that at least eight hundred thousand illegal aliens will be granted protection from deportation and other “rights” inconsistent with Federal law simply because President Obama so desires. As suggested below, the Supreme Court may well have something relevant to say when it decides, later this month, what to do about the Arizona immigration law appeal currently before it. There seems to be much anticipation that the Court will uphold the Arizona laws in major part and hence reverse a 9th Circuit decision holding that they had unlawfully trod in an area preempted by Federal law.

There was great joy in Obamaville on June 15th. Katherine Archuleta, National Political Director, Obama for America dispatched an e-mail. It said,

Thanks to our president, this nation’s immigration policy just became more fair and more just.

Effective immediately, the Department of Homeland Security is taking steps to ensure that young, undocumented immigrants who were brought here as children by their parents, and who have followed the law since then, will be able to request temporary relief from deportation proceedings — and will be allowed to apply for authorization to work in this country.

They’re a group that we’ve come to call the “Dreamers” — and today, the country they love is telling them they should be able to dream as big as they want.

For years, the President has called on Congress to make common-sense fixes to our broken immigration system. They haven’t. So he did.

. . . .

Congress still has time to pass the DREAM Act. And if they do, policies like today’s will no longer be necessary.

We are not giving up on this issue.

Stand up and support the President today — and help send the message that this first big step must be followed by a real, permanent solution from Congress:

http://my.barackobama.com/Dreamers (Bold emphasis in original, italic emphasis added.)

This is not simply a matter “fairness” or even of the ordinary use of prosecutorial discretion, applied in individual cases, not to prosecute because the available evidence is weak or for other sufficient reasons. It establishes broad criteria for the exercise of discretion en masse to eight hundred thousand or more people of specified classes; thereby arguably discriminating against others. It also requires the Department of Homeland Security and other agencies to establish new procedures to implement the new policy. How soon will the new policy become effective?

The Secretary of Homeland Security has ordered Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP), and U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) to do the following:

1. To those that appear qualified, ICE and CBP should immediately exercise their discretion to stop deportation, on an individual basis.
2. There is no application available yet. It will take at least at least 60 days to put the program into effect.
3. Do not trust unlicensed lawyers and Notarios. Be clear, there is nothing to file now.
4. ICE is directed to begin implementing this process within 60 days of the date of this memorandum.
5. ICE is also instructed to immediately begin the process of deferring action against individuals who meet the above criteria whose cases have already been identified through the ongoing review of pending cases before the Executive Office for Immigration Review.

President Obama, in his desire to recover from an electoral sinking feeling brought on by his stagnant and staggering economy, increasing perceptions that in international relations he is a wuss and other political circumstances not to his liking, attempted an end-run around the Congress for what can not fairly be seen as for other than immediate political purposes. Even if raw reelection politics had nothing to do with his decision, his actions still overstepped the constitutional separation of powers between the Legislative and Executive branches. To implement that end-run, the Secretary of Homeland Security, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) employees, U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) employees and U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) employees now have lots of new work to do — all in derogation of Federal immigration law as previously established by the Congress in legislation signed into law by a President. Perhaps the agencies have enough money created or saved from various legislative funding authorizations. If not, maybe they can find ways to tap into President Obama’s campaign funds; that would be “fair” and therefore consistent with the stated bases for President Obama’s unilateral action. It would also be consistent with that action because it would also be an illegal action.

What might the Supreme Court’s soon-to-be-released Arizona immigration law decision mean?

When the Supreme Court decides this month what to do with the April 11, 2011 decision of the 9th Circuit in United States v. Arizona, whatever it says may well have implications for President Obama’s most recent usurpation. Since the Arizona immigration laws were passed in large part to enforce existing Federal immigration laws the Obama Administration had chosen not to enforce, the Court may have to touch upon some of the principles involved in President Obama’s June 15th announcement. Might his announcement have been in anticipation of, and an attempt to do an end run around, that decision? Governor Brewer thinks so. “Should the justices uphold the law as it was originally passed, Brewer says the president’s decision could undercut the bill’s effectiveness.” Possibly, but the Supreme Court may also undercut President Obama’s usurpation.

In United States v. Arizona, the Federal appellate court affirmed District Judge Bolton’s decision holding the then new Arizona immigration statutes unconstitutional on the ground of Federal preemption. I wrote here about the 9th Circuit decision and, perhaps of greater interest for present purposes, a rather stinging “concurring” opinion of Judge Bea. Reviewing that article written over a year ago made it quite easy to write this article.

Judge Bea’s was a great opinion, portions of which are quoted below. He challenged the Humpty Dumpty linguistics of the majority.

The majority has apparently mastered its Lewis Carroll:
“I don’t know what you mean by ‘glory,’ ” Alice said.
Humpty Dumpty smiled contemptuously. “Of course you don’t –
till I tell you. I meant ‘there’s a nice knock-down argument for you!’”
“But ‘glory’ doesn’t mean ‘a nice knockdown argument,’ ” Alice objected.
“When I use a word,” Humpty Dumpty said, in rather a scornful
tone, “it means just what I choose it to mean — neither more nor less.”
“The question is,” said Alice, “whether you can make words mean so many different things.”
“The question is,” said Humpty Dumpty, “which is to be master — that’s all.”

Judge Bea then pointed out that the majority’s interpretation of legislative intent had attributed to the Congress the intent of bureaucrats later charged with enforcing Federal immigration laws. That would have required the Congress to have had some previously undiscovered capacity for prescience enabling it to divine and approve later executive department interpretations. Judge Bea quite correctly observed:

It is Congress’s intent we must value and apply, not the intent of the Executive Department, the Department of Justice, or the United States Immigration and Customs Enforcement. Moreover, it is the enforcement of immigration laws that this case is about, not whether a state can decree who can come into the country, what an alien may do while here, or how long an alien can stay in this country. (Italic emphasis in original, bold emphasis added.)

He continued,

The majority also finds that state officers reporting illegal aliens to federal officers, Arizona would interfere with ICE’s [U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement] “priorities and strategies.” Maj. Op. at 4824. It is only by speaking in such important-sounding abstractions — “priorities and strategies” — that such an argument can be made palatable to the unquestioning. How can simply informing federal authorities of the presence of an illegal alien, which represents the full extent of Section 2(B)’s limited scope of state-federal interaction, possibly interfere with federal priorities and strategies — unless such priorities and strategies are to avoid learning of the presence of illegal aliens? What would we say to a fire station which told its community not to report fires because such information would interfere with the fire station’s “priorities and strategies” for detecting and extinguishing fires?

…

The majority’s arguments regarding how any of the state officers’ actions spelled out in Section 2(B) could interfere with federal immigration enforcement is consistent with only one premise: the complaining federal authorities do not want to enforce the immigration laws regarding the presence of illegal aliens, and do not want any help from the state of Arizona that would pressure federal officers to have to enforce those immigration laws. With respect, regardless what may be the intent of the Executive, I cannot accept this premise as accurately expressing the intent of Congress. (Italic emphasis added.)

Here is another point that seems pertinent: One of the bases upon which the 9th Circuit decided in favor of Federal preemption was that there was substantial foreign opposition to the then new Arizona laws. Much of that may well have been cultivated by statements of President Obama and Attorney General Holder disparaging the laws, even before they had bothered to read them. Now, of course, Mexican President Calderon (he correctly characterized it as an “unprecedented” move) and others are very happy with President Obama’s action. Perhaps they are as unfamiliar with the Constitution and laws of the United States as we are with theirs. Judge Bea wrote,

The majority fails to identify a federal foreign relation policy which establishes the United States must avoid “spillover effects,” if that term is meant to describe displeasure by foreign countries with the United States’ immigration policies. The majority would have us believe that Congress has provided the Executive with the power to veto any state law which happens to have some effect on foreign relations, as if Congress had not weighed that possible effect in enacting laws permitting state intervention in the immigration field. To the contrary, here Congress has established — through its enactment of statutes such as 8 U.S.C. §§ 1357(g)(10), 1373(c), and 1644 — a policy which encourages the free flow of immigration status information between federal and local governments. Arizona’s law embraces and furthers this federal policy; any negative effect on foreign relations caused by the free flow of immigration status information between Arizona and federal officials is due not to Arizona’s law, but to the laws of Congress. Second, the Executive’s desire to appease foreign governments’ complaints cannot override Congressionally mandated provisions — as to the free flow of immigration status information between states and federal authorities — on grounds of a claimed effect on foreign relations any more than could such a foreign relations claim override Congressional statues for (1) who qualifies to acquire residency in the United States, 8 U.S.C. § 1154, or (2) who qualifies to become a United States citizen, 8 U.S.C. § 1421 et seq. (Italic emphasis added)

Presumably, President Obama’s desire to appease his domestic constituency as well as foreign governments cannot override Congressionally mandated provisions either; which is what President Obama’s recent usurpation does.

Finally, the majority errs in finding that the threat of all 50 states layering their own immigration rules on top of federal law weighs in favor of preemption. In Buckman, the Supreme Court stated: “As a practical matter, complying with the FDA’s detailed regulatory regime in the shadow of 50 States’ tort regimes will dramatically increase the burdens facing potential applicants burdens not contemplated by Congress in enacting the FDCA and the MDA.” 531 U.S. at 350 (emphasis added). I fail to see how Congress could have failed to contemplate that states would make use of the very statutory framework that Congress itself enacted. Congress created the Law Enforcement Support Center “to provide alien status determination support to federal, state, and local law enforcement on a 24-hours-a-day, seven-days-a-week basis.” Congress also obligated ICE to respond to all immigration status inquiries from state and local authorities. 8 U.S.C. § 1373(c). In light of this, all 50 states enacting laws for inquiring into the immigration status of suspected illegal aliens is desired by Congress, and weighs against preemption. (Emphasis in original.)

President Obama’s decision to himself obviate existing Federal laws on immigration and immigration enforcement presents the inside of the glove on the outside of which Judge Bea wrote. The Arizona case involved Federal preemption of State laws; President Obama’s executive decision involves Executive preemption of Federal laws that the Congress had intended to be enforced and that presidents had signed into law. Should the Supreme Court agree with Judge Bea, and hold that the Arizona laws furthered rather than unconstitutionally preempted Federal immigration law which the Executive branch had improperly used discretion — not granted it by the Congress — to obviate, it will be difficult to argue that Executive preemption of Congressional authority by refusing to enforce those same Federal laws is unobjectionable. On the other hand, should the Court hold that the Arizona law was preempted by Federal law and hence invalid, it will be difficult to argue with a straight face that the Executive can properly preempt those same Federal laws by doing precisely what he had said less than a year before he could not do without violating the laws and Constitution he had sworn to uphold. In either event, it may be quite difficult to argue that the reelection of a sitting President is a sufficiently important Federal goal to justify such a presidential action.

Lawsuit against the Obama Administration?

Congressman Steve King has stated that he may sue the Obama administration.

“I expect to bring a lawsuit against the president of the United States to suspend his executive order,” said Mr. King, in a telephone interview with The Des Moines Register, adding that he did not know when he would file the lawsuit and that a group of conservative lawyers are already organizing in support of him.

Although the Supreme Court’s decision in the Arizona immigration law case may provide quite useful points for Congressman King’s use, there is at least one big problem that transcends substance: standing. That is rather a convoluted requirement. Briefly explained here, it is

the term for the ability of a party to demonstrate to the court sufficient connection to and harm from the law or action challenged to support that party’s participation in the case. In the United States, the current doctrine is that a person cannot bring a suit challenging the constitutionality of a law unless the plaintiff can demonstrate that the plaintiff is (or will imminently be) harmed by the law. Otherwise, the court will rule that the plaintiff “lacks standing” to bring the suit, and will dismiss the case without considering the merits of the claim of unconstitutionality.

Although Mr. King is the vice chairman of the House Immigration Subcommittee, that may well not be deemed sufficient to give him any greater standing to seek judicial review of the matter than any private citizen would have on the ground that the harm done to him is no greater than that done to anyone else. No matter how the Supreme Court decides the Arizona case, it will be interesting to see how Mr. King attempts to show sufficient standing to argue the matter in court.

First published at Dan Miller’s Blog.

By Patrick Hobin
Newsmax.com

The long feud between “America’s toughest sheriff” and the nation’s president just got longer.

Sheriff Joe Arpaio said Friday’s move by President Barack Obama to give amnesty to children of illegal immigrants is politically motivated and will encourage more Mexicans to cross the border but that he will still enforce all immigration laws in his state of Arizona.

“It seems to be politically motivated,” Arpaio told a Phoenix ABC News affiliate. “I would rather see the president let the Congress decide what to do with this issue and other illegal immigration problems.”

For the Maricopa County sheriff, this is yet another battle in a simmering war with the White House. Last December, the Justice Department released a scathing report accusing Arpaio and his office of committing a wide range of civil rights violations against Latinos. Justice Department investigators said the abuses included a pattern of racial profiling.

The Justice Department also accused Arpaio’s office of a pattern of discrimination and carrying out heavy-handed immigration patrols based on racially charged citizen complaints.

The report was a result of the department’s three-year investigation of Arpaio’s office amid complaints of racial profiling and a culture of bias at the agency’s top level.

Read more: Newsmax

A m e r i c a n  P o s t – G a z e t t e

Distributed by C O M M O N  S E N S E , in Arizona

Out of control activist judiciary panel reports to State Bar, so they rubberstamped disbarment of Thomas

Tea Parties and conservatives are encouraged to show their support for former Maricopa County Attorney Andrew Thomas tomorrow as he holds a press conference denouncing a panel’s decision to disbar him, another deputy attorney, and suspend a third deputy attorney. Thomas tried to root out corruption in Maricopa County and was fought every way by powerful, entrenched liberal politicians. When he tried to prosecute crooked County Supervisors like Mary Rose Wilcox and judges, they filed bar complaints against him, knowing that the liberal State Bar would pounce on them.

Thomas has been an activist conservative who stood up for the rule of law, including immigration laws. The panel that made the decision to disbar him was composed of two attorneys and one member of the public. The judge on the panel had ruled against Thomas in the past when he tried to prosecute corruption, so he was already biased against him, and should have recused himself but did not. Those attorneys report to the State Bar of Arizona. The State Bar of Arizona has made it REALLY CLEAR that they will go after anyone who dares defend Thomas. Ernie Calderon, a former State Bar president and Democrat, dared to stand up and issue an ethics opinion defending Thomas. In retaliation, the State Bar removed him from his position as the State Bar’s representative to the American Bar Association.

The press conference will be held tomorrow, Wednesday, April 11, at 10:30 a.m. at the plaza between the Orpheum and the Wells Fargo Building, a public area between Second and Third Avenues on Adams Street in downtown Phoenix. People can park in the Wells Fargo parking lot or along the streets or other parking garages. It shouldn’t take more than half an hour.

People should attend if they don’t want to see our state become as corrupt as Mexico, as we already have the illegal immigration to go with it. The far left is taking down conservatives in Arizona who dare to speak up one by one. First they took out Thomas, then they went after Russell Pearce and successfully took him down. Their next target is Sheriff Arpaio. Click here for their article, “After Attorney’s Disbarment, Latino Groups Want Arpaio Brought Down Next.”

This kangaroo court ignored all the evidence that has come out about how corrupt Maricopa County government is. Here is just some of the corruption that has taken place since the trial – but the panel refused to consider it:

March

–FDIC is suing lenders over a risky loan they gave to Supervisor Stapley. This is a loan that Thomas and Aubuchon tried to investigate Stapley for.

http://sonoranalliance.com/2012/03/28/fdic-sues-over-risky-land-loan-to-stapley/

–County employees including County Manager David Smith played in pricey golf foursomes with vendors, in exchange were given lucrative Court Tower contracts. Thomas tried to investigate the Supervisors over the Court Tower.

http://sonoranalliance.com/2012/03/16/new-court-tower-scandal-county-corruption-and-golf-tournament/

–Judge who protected the County Supervisors, ruling against Thomas’s investigations, abruptly resigns in the middle of his term with no explanation

http://sonoranalliance.com/2012/03/12/another-judge-who-protected-the-county-supervisors-abruptly-resigns/

–Supervisor Stapley announces he is not going to run for reelection, and won’t even run for Congress – he knows he has no chance since all his corruption has come out

http://sonoranalliance.com/2012/03/04/targeted-by-conservatives-and-tea-party-activists-stapley-elects-to-fail-upward/

–Arizona Project 2012 Tea Party announces victory at stopping two Supervisors from running for reelection. They had made targeting the Supervisors their #1 priority this year due to all the corruption.

http://sonoranalliance.com/2012/03/01/arizona-2012-project-rabble-busters/

February

–County Manager David Smith abruptly resigns. Smith had filed the bar complaints against Thomas and his deputies and was the County Supervisors’ hatchetman.

http://sonoranalliance.com/2012/02/29/corrupt-county-manager-david-smith-abruptly-resigns/

December

–Liberal Arizona Republic columnist Laurie Roberts admits there must have been something to Thomas’s investigation of the Court Tower

http://sonoranalliance.com/2011/12/15/republic-writer-hints-that-court-tower-investigation-was-vindicated/

–Engineer in charge of Court Tower project fired (he’s rumored to want to go public about it)

http://sonoranalliance.com/2011/12/14/high-level-county-employee-managing-court-tower-project-fired/

–Several county employees fired or suspended for accepting bribes from vendors on Court Tower

http://sonoranalliance.com/2011/12/12/county-employees-accepted-free-gifts-from-companies-awarded-court-tower-contracts/

November

–County Supervisors & cronies lawsuits against Thomas & Arpaio thrown out

http://www.teapartytribune.com/2011/11/01/judge-dismisses-county-officials-lawsuits-against-arpaio-and-thomas/

October

–Supervisors continue firing attorneys who attempt to represent Thomas

http://sonoranalliance.com/2011/10/29/supervisors-continue-to-fire-more-lawyers-from-defending-andrew-thomas/

–Steve Chucri files to run for County Supervisor against Don Stapley since he realizes he will easily win

http://www.icarizona.com/2011/10/steve-chucri-files-candidacy-for.html

Read the full story about this show trial and kangaroo court at Worldnetdaily.
Read a full-page ad taken out in the Arizona State Bar’s magazine denouncing the State Bar’s prosecution of Thomas signed by a former AZ Attorney General, an ethics expert, a former president of the AZ State Bar, a former Chief Justice of the AZ Supreme Court, and a former disciplinary counsel for two State Bars.
Read the Maricopa County GOP EGC resolution denouncing the State Bar.