Napolitano Loses Moral Compass, Finds Russell Pearce

Our view: Legislature, governor appear to be grandstanding with new law aimed at employers who hire illegal immigrants

TUCSON (Arizona Daily Star) July 5, 2007 — It's a good idea to impose sanctions against employers who knowingly hire illegal immigrants. It would be an even better idea if employers had an ironclad method of verifying the citizenship of a job applicant and if sanctions were one part of a bigger immigration package.

Despite the absence of an efficient verification system, and despite the indisputable fact that immigration enforcement is a federal responsibility, Gov. Janet Napolitano signed a bill Monday that she called "the most aggressive action in the country" against those who knowingly hire undocumented workers.

That the action is aggressive, we have no doubt. But we are equally certain it is a shameless display of political bravado disguised as leadership, an attempt to show that when Congress lacks the political will to tackle a critical problem, enlightened lawmakers in Arizona will step in and fill the void.

This new state law is a colossal bit of grandstanding, the political equivalent of dumping a cup of sugar into a car's gas tank.  

It may well muck up the engine and slow both the economy and the employment of illegal workers in construction jobs, agriculture and the hospitality industry.

And maybe it will also compel employers in those industries to pay higher wages to American citizens, assuming they have any interest in such work. And maybe that added cost of doing business will be passed along to the newly protected Americans, like state Rep. Russell Pearce, R-Mesa, author of the sanctions bill.

Probably Pearce and others who felt threatened by the hordes of workers crossing the border illegally will not mind if prices go up. They'll see it as the price of security.

Everything, of course, has a price, including this bill.

Although the governor signed it, she has no clue where the money will come from to enforce its provisions, much less defend it when it comes up against the inevitable court challenge. The bill includes $100,000 to the Attorney General's Office for enforcement, $1.5 million for Maricopa County and $500,000 to Pima County. In a state budget of roughly $10 billion, this is called lunch money. But let's not get bogged down in details.

The important thing, as most Democrats and Republicans know, is that it now appears they have done something meaningful, even if all they've done is to adopt a pig in a poke.

Many of those who backed this bill previously were adamant in the belief — accurate, as it turns out — that immigration law is the purview of the federal government. But that was yesterday, or six months ago.

Now we know that when it comes to immigration reform, members of the U.S. Senate have joined the ranks of those who can't walk and chew gum. Who can we turn to for protection against gardeners and framers and ditch diggers and lettuce pickers and nannies?

Clearly, we can rely on vigilant members of the Arizona Legislature and the Democratic governor. Both know that, politically, supporting Pearce's bill is like fishing in a barrel. You can't miss.

Republicans who have consistently been criticized for going easy on employer sanctions because they don't want to disrupt the free-enterprise system now take the moral high ground. Liberal Democrats who have always maintained that too much attention is going into enforcement — translation: Secure the borders and keep those Mexicans out — now look like they're achieving their goal of drying up the exploitive businesses that help to lure immigrants into the country in the first place.

And so, by adopting a bill that says the state can suspend your business license if you hire illegal workers once, and if you do it twice, the state can shut you down completely, everybody looks good — especially if we overlook the spectacle of Napolitano standing shoulder to shoulder with Pearce, a spokesman for the far right who has said of illegal immigrants, "I'd come, too, if you could give me a job and free everything."

Democrats who think the governor looks good standing next to Pearce have lost their compass. Maybe the governor is able to parse "job" and "free everything" better than we can.

We were happy to see that other members of the governor's party were not as seduced by a flawed that merely holds out the illusion of substance.

Some Democrats from Southern Arizona had the courage to vote against it. They are House Minority Leader Phil Lopes, Reps. David Bradley, Tom Prezelski and Steve Farley, and Sens. Marsha Arzberger, Jorge Luis Garcia and Victor Soltero.

One theory holds that Arizona's action will now spread to other states and create a mighty wind that will blow into Washington and finally motivate Congress to adopt comprehensive immigration reform.

Frankly, that sounds like delusional thinking, but it's not impossible if we all live long enough.