INSIGHT
Books Philippa Gregory extends her reign with ‘The Red Queen’/5D
SUNDAY August 1, 2010
SALISBURY POST
Chris Verner, Editorial Page Editor, 704-797-4262 cverner@salisburypost.com
www.salisburypost.com
Sheriff
Not to be tolerated
JOE
Here’s what’s wrong with a new mosque at Ground Zero BY CLIFFORD D. MAY
Arizona lawman could be poster child for fighting illegal immigration BY AND
Scripps Howard News Service
ear Mayor Bloomberg, A few questions you might want to ask before approving a mosque for Ground Zero. Your Honor: In regard to the proposal to build an Islamic center at the site of the 9/11/01 terrorist attack in Manhattan, I commend you for saying: “Everything the United States stands for and New York stands for is tolerance and openness, and I think it’s a great message for the world...” But I would urge you to question whether this project truly represents that idea — or whether it undermines it. Start with this: Before this project is approved, surely you should know who will be picking up the more than $100 million tab. Would you not be distressed were it later to be revealed that funds had been contributed by people who finance terrorism?
D
Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio
JACQUES BILLEAUD AMANDA LEE MYERS Associated Press
HOENIX — Lost in the hoopla over Arizona’s immigration law is the fact that state and local authorities for years have been doing their own aggressive crackdowns in the busiest illegal gateway into the country. Nowhere in the U.S. is local enforcement more present than in metropolitan Phoenix, where Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio routinely carries out sweeps, some in Hispanic neighborhoods, to arrest illegal immigrants. The tactics have made him the undisputed poster boy for local immigration enforcement and the anger that so many authorities feel about the issue. “It’s my job,” said Arpaio, standing beside a sheriff’s truck that has a number for an immigration hot line written on its side. “I have two state (immigration) laws that I am enforcing. It’s not federal, it’s state.”
P
A ruling Wednesday by a federal judge put on hold parts of the new law that would have required officers to dig deeper into the fight against illegal immigration. Arizona says it was forced to act because the federal government isn’t doing its job to fight immigration. The issue led to demonstrations across the country Thursday, including one directed at Arpaio in Phoenix in which protesters beat on the metal door of a jail and chanted, “Sheriff Joe, we are here. We will not live in fear.” And in another sign of the divisive atmosphere surrounding the issue, authorities said the judge had received menacing threats and police were investigating whether a bullet hole found in the office of an Arizona congressman was related to the immigration debate. Meanwhile, Gov. Jan Brewer’s lawyers went to court to overturn the judge’s ruling so they can fight back against what the Republican calls an “invasion” of illegal immigrants. Ever since the main flow of illegal immigrants into the country shifted to Arizona a decade ago, state politicians and local police have been feeling pressure to confront the state’s border woes. In addition to Arpaio’s crackdowns, other efforts include a
ASSoCiAteD preSS
Maricopa County Sheriff’s deputies process a suspect arrested during a crime suppression sweep in phoenix thursday — Sheriff Joe Arpaio’s 17th immigration and crime sweep in two years. Hundreds of immigrant rights supporters delayed the effort with a rally in opposition to Arizona’s new immigration law. See SHERIFF, 4D A judge put the most controversial elements of the law on hold, but allowed other portions to take effect.
Small S.C. town tries its own immigration law BY BRUCE SMITH Associated Press
UMMERVILLE, S.C. — In a quiet Southern bedroom community of gardens and parks across the country from Arizona, another skirmish in the battle over illegal immigration is brewing. Summerville Councilman Walter Bailey, worried there is a void in immigration laws, has proposed an ordinance that goes farther than state BAILEY law, which was sharpened two years ago to allow police to identify illegal immigrants for deportation. The proposal would prevent illegal immigrants from living in the town of 45,000, which calls itself “Flower Town in the Pines,” and in most cases prevent them from working here. Bailey, a former state prose-
S
cutor, says it was prompted in part by the Obama administration’s challenge of the new Arizona law that was to have taken effect last week. “It was outrageous that when, by default, the state of Arizona has to go in there and do the job the federal government ought to be doing — instead of showing appreciation and support in Arizona, the federal government sues,” Bailey said. A federal judge on Wednesday blocked key aspects of the Arizona law, but Bailey said his ordinance is different enough that he doesn’t think the judge’s ruling applies. Bailey’s proposal not only requires most employers to check the immigration status of workers but those who rent homes or apartments in town would have
1D
to prove they are citizens or in the country legally. “The federal government and to a lesser extent the state government is not doing a whole lot about the immigration problem,” he said. He expects some council opposition but says most of the people he has spoken to favor the ordinance. Two years ago, the state passed a tough immigration law allowing State Law Enforcement Division officers to train with federal agencies in immigration enforcement. Since 2006, almost 116,000 people have been sent out of the U.S. by officers in 64 law enforcement agencies nationwide deputized to help enforce immigration laws under the federallocal partnership, called the 287(g) program. But SLED Chief Reggie Lloyd
Workers and those who rent homes or apartments in town would have to prove they are citizens or in the country legally.
says the agency’s state budget has been cut since the South Carolina law passed and told lawmakers this year while illegals are arrested for serious crimes, the agency doesn’t have the resources to enforce workplace immigration checks. Bailey’s ordinance is based on a recent Fremont, Neb., ordinance already under court challenge. He is concerned about a challenge to the Summerville law if it passes but “I don’t think the threat of expensive litigation ought to keep us from doing the right thing. Sometimes you have to figure out what is right and stand up for it and take your lumps.” According to the National Conference of State Legislatures, lawmakers in 44 states passed 191 state laws and adopted 128 resolutions on immigration in the first six months of this year. Five were vetoed. There are numerous local im-
See S.C. TOWN, 4D
You’ll recall that, after the 9/11 attacks, your predecessor, Mayor Rudy Giuliani turned down a $10 million check from a Saudi prince who had said that America shares blame for the atrocity. Feisal Abdul Rauf, the imam behind the Islamic center project, has said that U.S. policies “were an accessory to the crime that happened.” How is that any different? By the way, the Saudi royal family embraces Wahhabism, an interpretation of Islam that cannot be said to value “tolerance and openness.” Among other things, in Saudi Arabia non-Muslim houses of worship are prohibited and “infidels” — people like you and me — may not set foot in the holy cities of Mecca and Medina upon pain of death. Newt Gingrich has called on Abdul Rauf to state clearly that he disagrees with such policies. Is that not a reasonable request? I have an additional suggestion: If this project — also called the “Cordoba Initiative”— is really to be a 13story home for “multi-faith collaboration,” should it not contain a synagogue and a church as well as a mosque? I would recommend putting each on a different floor. On the highest floor, let’s put the church since Christians founded this great nation of ours. One floor down, let’s put a synagogue, since Jews were among the earliest immigrants to find religious freedom in America. And one floor further down, we’d have the mosque, a place for a newer generation of immigrants to gather and worship freely. Here’s my guess: Abdul Rauf will find it blasphemous that you want this center to give equal status to Christianity and Judaism. And he will see putting a church and synagogue on higher floors as symbolizing more than equality. A little relevant history: Islam began, proudly, as a warriors’ religion. Beginning in the 7th century, Islamic armies burst out of Arabia and conquered much of the known world. Among their practices: to raze the houses of worship of those they defeated and build mosques upon the ruins. This was a way of sending a message. The al-Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem is built on the site where the First and Second Temples of the Jewish people once stood. When Muslim armies conquered the ancient Christian capital of Constantinople, later to be re-named Istanbul, they
See TOLERATED, 4D