Arizona Proposition 200 (2004)
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Proposition 200, an Arizona state referendum passed in November 2004 with 56% of the vote, requires individuals to produce proof of citizenship before they may register to vote or apply for public benefits in Arizona. The proposition also makes it a misdemeanor for public officials to fail to report persons unable to produce documentation of citizenship who apply for these benefits, and allows citizens who believe that public officials have given undocumented persons benefits to sue for remedies. Authors of the ballot measure, the Protect Arizona Now committee, wrote it because of a serious concern for lax voter registration and voting procedures and concerns that public services to immigrants from neighboring Mexico, many of whom are illegal immigrants, were too costly. Opponents called it anti-immigrant, and considered it to be reminiscent of California's 1994 Proposition 187.
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[edit] Proponents
Despite a huge effort by political leadership on both sides of the aisle to defeat it, the electorate passed Proposition 200 with 56 percent of voters voting in the affirmative. Proving that immigration is an "elite vs. public" issue rather than a "right vs. left" issue due to the fact that the wealthy are more likely to benefit from increases in cheap labor while the middle class and the poor view cheap illegal immigration labor as a threat to their livelihood, the opposition to Prop. 200 was made up of a bipartisan group of elites. Senator John McCain (R), Senator Jon Kyl (R), Governor Janet Napolitano (D), the Arizona Republican Party, the Arizona Democratic Party, the Green Party, the Libertarian Party, the AFL-CIO, and other bi-partisan elected officials and organizations were all opposed to Protect Arizona Now. [1] These groups spent hundreds of thousands of dollars campaigning against the will of the public. Meanwhile, the Big-Business op-ed page of the Wall Street Journal, in keeping with its support of cheap labor in the form of illegal immigration, opposed Prop. 200. [2] Tamar Jacoby, a business interest supporter opposed Prop. 200 in the Los Angeles Times. [3]
Two separate, rival groups were supporting Proposition 200: Prop 200's sponsor "Protect Arizona Now" led by Kathy McKee and supported at the national level by the Carrying Capacity Network (CCN) and Population-Environment Balance (PEB), and "Yes on 200" led by Rusty Childress and supported at the national level by FAIR. The split within PAN, which McKee described as an "attempted hijacking of a local effort by greedy, out-of-state interests", highlighted an ongoing feud within the immigration reduction movement between FAIR and the two national groups which dates back to at least 2003, with CCN and PEB issuing frequent statements accusing FAIR (as well as NumbersUSA) of being "reform lite" and "undermining real immigration reform".
The Protect Arizona Now committee was formed by Kathy McKee and Rusty Childress, who became its chair and treasurer respectively. The PAN National Advisory Board was chaired by Dr. Virginia Abernethy, and included Dr. David Pimentel and Marvin Gregory. Childress later joined a separate effort, Yes On 200, organized by the Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR).
During the signature gathering campaign, Kathy McKee accused Rusty Childress, a Phoenix-area car dealer and PAN's treasurer, of withholding funds and petitions from PAN, and fired Childress. Childress sued McKee over custody of PAN's signatures and funds, but the court ruled in favor of McKee. Childress and the two most prominent supporters of the initiative within the Arizona state legislature, Russell Pearce and Randy Graf, then formed a separate organization, Yes On 200, which was funded almost entirely by out-of-state interests. When FAIR began an independent signature gathering campaign to collect the remaining signatures needed to put the initiative on the ballot, McKee accused FAIR of attempting a hostile takeover of PAN. McKee named Virginia Abernethy the chair of PAN's national advisory board. FAIR responded by issuing a press release calling for both McKee and Abernethy to resign from PAN, calling Abernethy's views "repulsive separatist views." Abernethy drew heated criticism for her close relationship with the Council of Conservative Citizens, a direct descendent of the White Citizens' Councils of the 1950s, from which she had resigned. (Dr. Abernethy has described herself as "European-American, a category parallel to Hispanic-American, Jewish-American, or African-American ethnic identity.")
[edit] Campaign
On July 5, 2004, Protect Arizona NOW's Chairman, Kathy McKee, pursuant to Arizona law, submitted 190,887 signatures to the Arizona Secretary of State's office, surprising critics who had believed organizers would not be able to garner enough signatures before the deadline. A counter-organization, the Statue of Liberty Coalition, was formed to block Proposition 200, claiming the initiative is racist and will target Latino civil rights. Supporters also relied for justification on a FAIR study that determined that Arizona taxpayers pay $1.3 billion to cover health, education, and incarceration costs of illegal immigrants. This FAIR study is contradicted directly by the Wells-Fargo Thunderbird School of International Management, an international business graduate school in Phoenix, AZ, which in 2003 put out a study called "The Economic Impact of Arizona-Mexico Relationship". The study concludes that immigrants contribute $599 million to Arizona in income and sales taxes every year, while costing the State $250 million in services and $30 million in uncompensated health care. This generates a fiscal surplus for the state of $318 million per year.
Despite the claims that the initiative was racist or anti-Latino, exit polls found that 47% of Latino voters voted in favor of the initiative.
[edit] Implementation
A substantial legal battle has erupted over the precise definition of "public benefits." Arizona's Attorney General has ruled that the law only pertains to discretionary state programs. Federally funded entitlements like food stamps and subsidized school lunches are examples of public benefits to which, given the Attorney General's finding, the new law will not apply. Proposition 200's sponsor, Protect Arizona NOW, continues to hold to the wording of Prop 200 that applies the welfare portion of the initiative to the nearly 60 programs contained in Arizona Revised Statutes Title 46-Welfare.
The new law, in its current interpretation, is controversial. Despite withstanding three pre-election and two post-election lawsuits, legal challenges to Proposition 200 are still pending. "Yes on 200" filed a post-election lawsuit (oppoed by Protect Arizona NOW, initially dismissed in the lower court but currently on appeal saying that the Attorney General overstepped his bounds when he narrowed the definition of "public benefits." On the other hand, opponents say that the measure is possibly unconstitutional, xenophobic, possibly racist, and definitely inhumane. The City Council of Phoenix, AZ has already declared that the city will pay to defend any city employee charged for failing to report an undocumented alien; other cities may follow suit.
As of December 23, 2004, the federal appeals court in Tucson, AZ had removed an earlier restraining order that had kept the state from enacting the law. The new law is, for the time being, now exigent, with the definition of "public benefits" promulgated by the Governor and Attorney General. City, state, and county workers will be fined up to $700 for each instance in which they provide such benefits to persons who cannot produce evidence of citizenship.
Still, the powerful elites who opposed the measure in the first place continue to work overtime to defeat it in the courts despite 56 percent of Arizona voters voting it into law. Judges are mixed on the issue and there is a strong possibility of the proposition being brought to the U.S. Supreme Court. For now, it seems safe as it was just upheld by U.S. District Judge Roslyn Silver who wrote that the challengers "have not shown a strong likelihood of success on the merits, the balance of hardships favor the defendants and the public interest would not be advanced by granting the injunction."[4]
Kathy McKee has since started a new group, Protect America NOW, to support similar initiatives in other states.
[edit] Identification at the polls
Proposition 200 also provided for the requirement of voter identification at the place of voting. no major elections took place after its adoption but before November 7, 2006 and the actual implementation for this feature of the proposition remained unclear. Opponents challenged the constitutionality of such a requirement upon voters, arguing that such a law could be used to discriminate against ethnic groups, thus violating the Fifteenth Amendment. On October 5, 2006 the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals temporarily suspended the requirement of poll identification, a little over a month from the election[5]. However, the ruling was stayed fifteen days later by the U.S. Supreme Court [6].
