July 28, 2010 Update:  District Court issues Order enjoining portions of SB 1070.  Read the July 28, 2010 Order.

July 6, 2010 Update: US Department of Justice files complaint claiming Arizona is preempted by exclusive federal authority to regulate immigration.  Read the complaint filed by the United States Department of Justice to enjoin enforcement of SB 1070, filed on July 6, 2010. 

June 28, 2010 Update: US Supreme Court will hear constitutional challenge to Arizona claims that it can regulate immigration.  Read NY Times story.

On June 21, 2010, SALT, along with thirty-seven other public interest organizations, filed amicus in Friendly House v. Whiting, calling for an injunction against implementation of SB 1070, the draconian Arizona immigration statute.   The amicus brief was drafted by Covington & Burling, under the supervision of the Asian Pacific American Legal Center.  An amended amicus brief was filed on July 14, 2010, in order for the brief to conform to page limitations. 

As stated in the brief: SB 1070 invites Arizona law enforcement officers to place individuals in one of two tiers. In the first tier are those who do not arouse suspicion that they are “unlawfully present” in the United States. In the second tier are those who do, whether because of their ethnicity, skin color, facial features, hair, accent, or clothing. Enforcement of SB 1070 thus necessarily revolves around a subjective decision that there is a “reasonable suspicion” someone is “unlawfully present” based on physical appearance and language. It will subject United States citizens and legal residents who are members of racial and ethnic minority groups, and particularly those who may be perceived to be somehow “foreign,” to the disruption, stress, and humiliation of detention and interrogation, and to the constant fear of the possibility of such treatment.

The impact of SB 1070 will be far-reaching. Amici write with particular concern regarding the likelihood that it will chill the willingness of many United States citizens and legal residents to report and cooperate in the investigation of crimes, including hate crimes. It may all too easily result in an erosion of trust in government in general, and of law enforcement in particular.

The harms that threaten to unfold from enforcement of SB 1070 do so even though the statute contains facially neutral language. For more than 150 years, the courts have prevented enforcement of laws, even neutrally worded ones, that unfairly targeted racial, ethnic, and religious minority populations. Like those laws, SB 1070 invites second class treatment of entire communities. The Court should enjoin it.

Read the July 14, 2010 Amicus brief.

Read the complaint filed by the United States Department of Justice to enjoin enforcement of SB 1070, filed on July 6, 2010.