With the Supreme Court set to hear arguments for and against Arizona's anti-immigration law today, we turn to another court for its ruling -- the court of public opinion. In advance of tomorrow's proceedings, America's Voice Education Fund analyzed how immigration and SB 1070-type laws are play out among the American people. The results might be surprising for many observers.
Politicians are often confused about where the public stands on the issue of immigration reform. While polls show support for state-based immigration laws, there is even stronger support for federal, comprehensive reform. How is this possible, and why? And do politicians have to choose between courting Latino voters and the general public when they stake out an immigration position, or is there clear common ground?
A new polling roundup released today by America's Voice Education Fund analyzed public opinion ahead of this week's Supreme Court argument on the Arizona anti-immigration law, SB 1070. We found two key points: 1) To Latinos, the fastest growing voting demographic, Arizona's law is both divisive and motivating; and 2) Overall, voters want action, but prefer comprehensive immigration reform.
First, for Latinos, Arizona's law is both discriminatory and motivating. When Arizona's SB 1070 became law in 2010, it received major attention in the national news -- both in English and in Spanish. For the Latino community, it became a symbol of the anti-immigrant and anti-Latino sentiment that has infected politics in recent years.
In May of 2010, 81% of Arizona Latinos opposed the law, according to an NCLR-Latino Decisions poll, and in November 2010, 74% of Latinos across the country were opposed, including 65% strongly opposed, according to Latino Decisions.
In November 2010, after months of news coverage over SB 1070, Republican opposition to the DREAM Act, and anti-immigrant campaigning by many candidates, 60% of Latino voters told Latino Decisions that immigration was "the most important" or "one of the important" issues in their voting decisions for the mid-term elections.
In November of 2011, Arizona State Senator Russell Pearce, the lead sponsor of SB 1070, lost his seat in a historic recall election thanks in large part to mobilization by Latino voters.
And, SB 1070 will be a motivating factor for Latinos in 2012. Dr. Gary Segura, a professor of political science at Stanford and principal at Latino Decisions, told my colleague Maribel Hastings, that regardless of the outcome of the case, SB 1070 will have political implications in both the short-term and long-term. He said, "If SB 1070 is upheld, Latinos will be inflamed, Republicans will embrace it and Latino turnout and enthusiasm for the election will go up. If SB 1070 is struck down, largely because the president authorized the Justice Department to sue, the president gets the benefit of all of that and you can expect Republicans to denounce the Court and to say predictably awful things about Latinos. So it's kind of good for Obama either way."
So, then, what about other voters?
Again, voters want action, but prefer comprehensive immigration reform. When asked about state-level immigration reforms like SB 1070, a majority of Americans are initially supportive. But research shows that this simply speaks to their firm belief that the immigration system is broken and that someone needs to take action to fix it. Larger majorities are in favor of balanced, federal laws like the DREAM Act and comprehensive immigration reform that represent a real solution to immigration challenges instead of get-tough crackdowns.
In a series of national polls taken in the months after SB 1070 was passed, a slim majority of Americans supported the law -- but a larger majority supported comprehensive immigration reform, including a path to legal status for the undocumented. This includes polls taken by the New York Times/CBS in May 2010 (64% supported comprehensive immigration reform; 51% said SB 1070 was "about right"); AP/Univision in May 2010 (59% supported comprehensive immigration reform; 42% supported SB 1070); and NBC/MSNBC in May 2010 (65% supported comprehensive immigration reform; 61% supported SB 1070).
Even in Arizona, a July 2010 Arizona Republic poll found that 62% of voters supported comprehensive immigration reform, while only 55% supported SB 1070. In addition, a poll conducted by Lake Research Partners for America's Voice/America's Voice Education Fund in summer 2010 found that an overwhelming 84% of voters who support Arizona's law also support comprehensive immigration reform.
Ultimately, Americans think immigration policy should be made by the federal government, not by the states. That's the legal issue the Supreme Court will be deciding. As the Lake poll found, a majority of people who support SB 1070 do so because "the federal government has failed to solve the problem." By the same token, however, 56% percent said that immigration should be dealt with at the federal level while only 22% said it should be dealt with by the states.
When voters learn the economic, societal, and legal costs associated with anti-immigration state laws, support declines. Even a July 2010 Rasmussen poll of Arizona voters found that 46% believed passing SB 1070 had had a negative impact on the state's image; 40% said it had a positive impact.
The numbers are actually crystal clear: Americans want a Federal fix to our broken immigration system, not a state-by-state patchwork of immigrant harassment laws like SB 1070. As the U.S. Supreme court takes up Arizona's "show me your papers" law, our nation's leaders should take note: this is more than just a Latino issue, it's an American issue.
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Predictably awful things like what? To some people, simply saying we should enforce the law is "anti-Latino".
This isn't so divisive. HALF of Latinos support SB 1070, and the rest of the country supports it in the neighborhood of 65%.
Your rhetoric is horrible and a failure.
I was rear-ended by a driver that had no driver's license, and spoke no English. When I called the State Troopers (it was on an interstate), I told them to send a Spanish speaking officer. They didn't, or couldn't find a Spanish speaking officer. After about an hour of messing around, the trooper told me the driver had no license, but did have insurance, and gave me the information. It of course turned out to be fraudulent. I'm out my deductible, and the month long cost of a rental car, and a bad driver gets to keep on driving in the US. All because we have gotten so politically correct that police can't respond in a realistic way when they just about know someone is in the country illegally.
I have SERIOUS issue with your polling from La Raza.
Take a look at some other polling coming from around the country...
"In national polls, there have consistently been more supporters than opponents of the Arizona law, with the latest polls showing higher support than at any point since its passage. More than two-thirds of registered voters (68 percent) approved of the law in an April Quinnipiac poll, while only about a quarter disapproved (27 percent). Voters backed the law by a slimmer 51 to 31 percent margin in Quinnipiac’s earliest gauge, which did not specify that the law requires police to verify some people’s legal status. The law has received at least 60 percent support in every public poll this year.
The law’s key provisions also enjoy wide public support. A May 2010 Pew poll taken just after the law was passed, 73 percent approved of the law’s requirement that people produce documents verifying their legal status, 67 percent approved of allowing the police to detain people who cannot do so and 62 percent approved of allowing police to question anyone they suspect is in the country illegally."
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/behind-the-numbers/post/arizona-immigration-law-persistently-popular/2012/04/25/gIQAAaiugT_blog.html
I would appreciate that you would choose not to quote such a strongly biased group like La Raza, unless that is the only way to present your one-sided argument.
There is no need for reform except to enforce our laws. Simple.
Former Rep. Ortiz lost his re-election bid to an Anglo, Farenthold, who had a tough anti-illegal platform in a district that is over 70% Hispanic. If a Democrat cannot win in a district with over 70% Hispanics, I would say that the idea that ALL Mexican Americans support illegals is WAY off base. They are proud Americans first and foremost and while proud of their heritage and culture,, they agree with ME in that we are ALL Americans and illegals are NOT the same as US citizens. Indeed I live here because I love the culture and have the best of both worlds.
The E-Verify system could be enhanced with retinal recognition, where the eye is photographed, and the retinal pattern compared with a database. This system could be installed in all public and retail buildings. In this way, an aggressive system that is above reproach can be implemented. The technology is available, and could be implemented nationwide in less than 6 months.
Here -- in the real world -- check the Quinnipiac poll. An overwhelming majority of voters like the law. Even a majority of HISPANIC voters favored the law.
You've lost this issue. Common sense and the rule of law has all but won now. You should start looking for a new line of work, because your side is toast. Maybe you could be a used-car salesman. They have a little more credibility than open-borders, pro-illegal propagandists.
What papers qualify as proof ?
Will everyone need a certified copy of birth or a passport ? I guess they could detain anyone who doesn't have these papers and, for the law to be fair, officers should be required to ask everyone who is stopped for papers not just because they have "suspicion". Otherwise, this will be an unfair burden on latino and black citizens.
They would only ask you if you didn't have a driver's license and didn't speak English.
What it seems we are being asked to do is allow people who knowingly broke our laws to have MORE rights than we do as citizens. I have to get my passport stamped, luggage screened, etc. But there is this other class of people that somehow deserve special treatment because they broke the law?
I do believe we should have a common sense immigration policy: Let in the people we need, with the skills we need, to drive our economy forward. Low wage poorly educated Mexican day laborers are not in the best interest of our economy or our labor pool.
There is no other country that I have been to that hands you citizenship papers simply for being born in that country. It is insanity. If a Mexican woman in this country illegally has a child that child is Mexican. If an American woman has a child in France that child is American.
Any citations or sources that confirm your above hypotheses?,most literature disagrees with your premise, also, if not the "best" interest,is it 2nd best, 678th best?.does eveything have to be in "the best"interest of the nation?If not, can it occur to you that it's stil a net positive? Is alcohol consumption in the "best" interest? The point that fails you is the illegal immigrants and the legal immigrants(me) strongly believe the immigration system to be arbitrary and tailored to match caricatures. Since the randomly chosen dude/dudette has no fckin clue about the harsh arbitrariness of the immig system,they (you) can posture via rhetorical flourishes eternally as it is irrelevant to their daily lives.Whereas to many immigs, since it's a matter of life as in "living it", so they choose to unavail themselves of the legal system's arbitrariness and live as undocs. Posturing is easy.Solutions are work inducing, which is hard for some native borns.
Christopher Hull is right, the truth got you butt hurt.
You should travel to other countries, and see their immigration policies, you will find NO ONE is this nice.
Do you carry your passport or certified birth certifcate with you every day ? Latino citizens would have to, for fear of being detained until the're verified.
Go read the law, it's only 16 pages.
But the BEST part is, Obama claims he never read the law, but seems to know every bit of a 2700-page health care law.
Heck the French police will give you a ticket if you don't have your picture on your metro card AND a matching ID! I think we could do things in a humane way without becoming a "police state." For example, start a tax on remittances or do what Brazil does and insist that any person opening a bank account have their version of a Social Security number. Do those two things you will get people choosing to go back to their own country. Most importantly employers need to be fined out of existence for hiring (and exploiting) undocumented workers. I don't know how old you are but do you remember when house painters used to be unionized and it was considered a "good job?" Now it entails standing in front of Dunn Edwards flagging down cars like a parking lot attendant.
BTW, I usually do carry my passport every day but I travel a lot and have just gotten used to having it with me. In other countries they require a foreign national to carry their documents.