Legal News

Entertainers speak out on Ariz. immigration law

A backlash against a new Arizona law cracking down on illegal immigration is broadening from the political to the sports and entertainment arenas with lawsuits filed, singers denouncing the measure and protesters gathering at an Arizona Diamondbacks baseball game.

A court suit from 15-year Tucson police veteran Martin Escobar was one of three filed Thursday, less than a week after Republican Gov. Jan Brewer signed the bill that critics claim is unconstitutional and fear will lead to racial profiling.

U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder has said the federal government may challenge the law, which requires local and state law enforcement to question people about their immigration status if there's reason to suspect they're in the country illegally, and which makes it a state crime to be in the United States illegally.

Brewer and other backers say the state law is necessary amid the federal government's failure to secure the border and growing anxiety over crime related to illegal immigration.

"Mexican-Americans are not going to take this lying down," singer Linda Ronstadt, a Tucson native, said at a news conference on a lawsuit planned by the American Civil Liberties Union, the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund and the National Immigration Law Center.

Colombian singer Shakira visited Phoenix to meet the city's police chief and mayor amid her concerns the measure would violate human and civil rights.

"It goes against all human dignity." she said.

At the Billboard Latin Music Awards ceremony in Puerto Rico, singer Ricky Martin denounced the law, too, saying it "makes no sense."

E-Verify misses half of illegal workers checked

A study says an online program some employers use to weed out illegal workers misses more than half the people it's supposed to identify.

The research company that evaluated the E-Verify system for the Homeland Security Department found 54 percent of the illegal immigrants checked through E-Verify are cleared to work because they are using stolen or borrowed identities.

E-Verify allows employers to run a worker's information against Homeland Security Department and Social Security databases to check whether the person is permitted to work in the U.S. Congress and the Obama administration are urging employers to use E-Verify voluntarily to help curb illegal immigration.

E-Verify correctly identified legal workers 93 percent of the time.

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Lawmakers try new approach to immigration changes

Latino lawmakers and advocates are taking a new approach to the push for changes in U.S. immigration policy.

They are making a humanitarian appeal to Americans to support fellow citizens who have relatives living in fear of detention and deportation.

A first step in this new initiative toward changes in immigration policy is a series of community meetings at churches in 17 cities. The initial meeting is set for Friday in Providence, R.I.

New York Congresswoman Nydia Velazquez says the National Family Unity Campaign will put a human face on how the immigration system that she calls "broken" is affecting the men and women of the United States.