[R-G] Surge in Immigration Laws Around U.S.

[Yoshie Furuhashi]

<http://www.nytimes.com/2007/08/06/washington/06immig.html>
August 6, 2007
Surge in Immigration Laws Around U.S.
By JULIA PRESTON

State legislatures, grappling with the failure of the federal
government to overhaul the immigration laws, considered 1,404
immigration measures this year and enacted 170 of them, an
unprecedented surge in state-level lawmaking on the issue, according
to a report by the National Conference of State Legislatures.

Spurred by rising resentment in the country over illegal immigration
and by the collapse of a broad immigration bill in the Senate in June,
state legislators nationwide adopted measures to curb employment of
unauthorized immigrants and to make it more difficult for them to
obtain state identification documents like driver's licenses.

While the political tide ran generally against illegal immigrants,
some states adopted measures to help them by protecting them from
exploitation and by extending education and health care to their
children. Fifteen states adopted laws intended to punish immigrant
smugglers, especially if their victims were foreigners coerced into
prostitution or other sexual commerce.

State lawmakers have introduced about two and half times more
immigration bills this year than in 2006, and the number that have
become law is more than double the 84 bills enacted last year,
according to the conference, a nonpartisan organization that includes
all the state legislatures. The report was scheduled to be released
today.

"States will act in a vacuum," said Leticia Van de Putte, a Democratic
state senator from Texas who is the president of the conference this
year. "The states are stepping up to the plate and doing what they
can, because not to act would be irresponsible."

Every state debated immigration issues, and 41 states adopted
immigration laws. A large number of new laws cracked down on employers
who hire illegal immigrants. The broadest measure was passed in
Arizona and signed into law by Gov. Janet Napolitano, a Democrat, in
July. Arizona employers who knowingly hire illegal immigrants face
suspension of their business license for the first offense and the
permanent loss of their license for a second offense within three
years. The law requires employers to verify the status of job
applicants with a federal immigration database known as Basic Pilot.

"The message loud and clear from our constituents was their
frustration that the federal government has not taken the necessary
action to secure the border," Timothy S. Bee, a Republican who is the
president of the Arizona Senate, said in a telephone interview
yesterday.

Tennessee made it a criminal offense, rather than a civil one, to
"recklessly employ" an illegal immigrant, with fines up to $50,000.
Several states passed laws denying state contracts to employers of
illegal immigrants, and other laws barred those immigrants from
collecting unemployment benefits. In all, 26 laws on employing
immigrants were passed in 19 states — covering the nation from Hawaii
to Arkansas to Georgia — with most of the measures intended to curb
illegal immigrants' access to jobs.

But in Illinois, lawmakers barred the state from requiring employers
to verify job applicants through the Basic Pilot system. The
legislators called the system unreliable and error-prone.

Several states — including Indiana, Kansas, Kentucky, Montana and
Nevada — passed new laws or hardened existing ones to bar illegal
immigrants from obtaining driver's licenses. The toughest law was
adopted in Louisiana, which now requires applicants' names to be
checked against a federal immigration database as well as the
Department of Homeland Security's terrorism watch list.

Eleven states enacted 15 laws on public benefits, most of them denying
state assistance to illegal immigrants. In May, Minnesota passed a
version of a federal law that makes illegal immigrants ineligible for
most medical aid.

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Yoshie