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Ok, well, this story sucks.
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States governors and legislators have always been harassing immigrants,
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but now Georgia, Florida and Texas have taken it to a
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whole new level. The Georgia State House passed a bill that
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allows for anyone suspected of being in the United States illegally to
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be arrested. Texas is also on the same wave.
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Texas law enforcement at state and local levels have the authority under
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law SB four to arrest jail and prosecute migrants for unauthorized entry
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or re entry into the US,
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which goes against the federal government's immigration policy.
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And Florida has proposed a bill that could get you arrested as
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a smuggler if you're driving someone around who is an illegal immigrant
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that's insane to help explain these bills and laws and how
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it will affect civilians.
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Is Emma Ringer from the American Immigration Council.
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Can you explain how these new laws and bills will lead
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to profiling? As you just mentioned,
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lots of states are passing laws or considering passing laws that allow
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police officers and other local law enforcement authorities to arrest or detain
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a person based only on the fact that that person supposedly came
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into the country illegally or is undocumented.
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So, this law called SB for creates new state crimes for
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illegally entering Texas from Mexico and illegally reentering Texas after being deported
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And that part even applies if someone is now has legal
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status, they could still in theory be arrested in,
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And it also requires Texas judges to order people deported
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if they're convicted of these new crimes.
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Now, as you mentioned,
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there are a lot of problems with this law,
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including that states are not supposed to decide who can enter
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this country and they definitely aren't supposed to deport people.
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And that's why the federal government has filed a lawsuit challenging the
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law. And why the federal court has blocked it from
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going into effect. So that case is at the Supreme
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Court and we should find out soon whether SP four will actually
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go into effect. But as you mentioned,
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a big problem with these laws is that they essentially tell police
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officers right, that they can arrest somebody that they think is
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here illegally and that raises real concerns about racial profiling,
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right? There are a lot,
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there have been a lot of studies showing that police already disproportionately
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target black and brown people for stops and arrests.
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And now these laws basically have local law enforcement of officers
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looking for people, they think look undocumented,
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right. On that note,
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like what makes someone look illegal.
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Should we like, what can we tell people about?
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is there a way that we can look not illegal?
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Like, I don't understand there's no such thing as looking illegal
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right? But I think when you talk about what to
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It's really important to remember that everybody has constitutional rights when they
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are approached by the police.
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and this is true no matter what your immigration status is
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right. You do not have to tell a police officer your
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immigration status. You can say that you need to speak to
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a lawyer. It's really good to investigate your rights because
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there are lots of resources out there even if you just Google
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you're right. There are a ton of good sources out
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there. Thank you so much for joining us today and
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helping us understand a little bit more,
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helping our community understand a little bit more.
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because like you said,
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they do have rights and often times they end up feeling like
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it's laws like these that make them feel like they don't.
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So it's always important to talk about no matter how difficult
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Emma, thank you and thank you for having me.
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Thank you for coming on.
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