High court to weigh Arizona's voter-ID law

Jesus Gonzalez worked as a farm laborer and factory hand in Arizona. He lived in the United States for more than four decades. Earning citizenship, along with the right to vote, was a dream.

Government and political reporter Rebekah Sanders is on assignment in Washington, D.C., where she will cover Monday's oral arguments before the U.S. Supreme Court. Follow her updates at azcentral.com.

So he couldn't believe it when, after finally taking the citizenship oath at the Yuma federal courthouse in 2005 and filling out his election paperwork, he received two notices from the state that his voter registration had been denied.

"I was angry," he would later tell a court. "After all of my hardship and struggles to finally become a U.S. citizen, I was still treated like a second-class citizen of this country. … We should all have an equal right to elect the people who make the decisions in our country. I want to have a voice in the United States."

An Arizona law that has inflamed passions on both sides of the immigration debate heads to the U.S. Supreme Court for oral arguments Monday. It could affect not just the sanctity of elections, but the fundamental right to vote.

The measure -- approved by Arizona voters a year before Gonzalez became a citizen -- aims to keep ballots out of the hands of illegal immigrants. Anyone registering to vote must provide documentation of U.S. citizenship.

In Arizona vs. The Inter Tribal Council of Arizona Inc., the Supreme Court will decide whether the state can require proof of citizenship in all cases of voter registration or just some. Courts already have allowed the state to demand proof of citizenship with state voter-registration forms. Now, the justices will consider whether the state can also impose such requirements on federal voter-registration forms.

A decision is expected this summer.

Opponents claim that under the law, thousands of eligible Arizona voters -- in particular the young, the elderly, minorities and naturalized citizens such as the now 63-year-old Gonzalez -- are prevented, or at least delayed, from registering to vote. Supporters, including those in other states that have adopted or considered similar measures, contend that enforcing the law is Arizona's right in order to protect the integrity of the electoral process.

The case is the second election-law dispute before the Supreme Court in less than four weeks. Arizona has a stake in both. Alabama's challenge on Feb. 27 to the landmark Voting Rights Act, which could free Arizona and other states from three decades of scrutiny by the Department of Justice over racial discrimination in election procedures, drew more national attention.

But experts and parties to the Arizona lawsuit say this case, too, could set precedent in how elections are conducted across the country.

Arizona argues that its constitutional election powers supersede those of Congress when it comes to verifying who is eligible to vote. The state says its law requiring proof of citizenship with voter registration should take precedence no matter what.

The case spotlights the tension between protecting election integrity -- which Arizona argues its law does -- and encouraging wider voter participation, which Congress sought to do with a simple, nationwide federal registration form that requires only a signature -- under penalty of perjury -- to confirm citizenship.

"This is about a state imposing restrictions that make voter registration more difficult. Whether it's justified or not, it puts an additional hurdle in the way of the process," said Justin Levitt, an elections-law expert at Yale and Loyola law schools. "This case is about how smooth voter registration can be."

If the Supreme Court sides with Arizona, critics say, thousands of Arizonans could be prevented unnecessarily from registering to vote. If the Supreme Court sides with opponents of the law, Arizona elections could become more complicated. Lower-court decisions caused confusion in the most recent election, when the state was forced to treat state and federal voter-registration forms differently.

Opponents of Arizona's law say Gonzalez's story exemplifies the need to overturn it.

Though Gonzalez is a citizen, mix-ups in the information the state asked for to prove his legal status hindered his registration and caused him to give up. He later sued, along with Native American, Latino, voter-registration and civil-rights groups.

Dual election process

Arizona's law, which Republican Attorney General Tom Horne will defend before the high court, was approved by voters overwhelmingly in 2004. The ballot initiative known as Proposition 200 was designed to combat illegal immigration.

Under the law, Arizona voters must show identification at the polls, and county recorders must reject any voter-registration form that lacks documentary proof of citizenship -- which can include a copy of a driver's license issued after 1996, a passport, birth certificate, naturalization number or tribal card.

As the case wound through the legal system, lower courts agreed that the state can require voters to present ID on Election Day.

But a divided 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals said last year that while Arizona could demand proof of citizenship for state voter-registration forms, it could not do so for the federal voter-registration form created by Congress in 1993 as part of the National Voter Registration Act. Both forms are used to register voters in Arizona.

The ruling set up an unusual situation in the 2012 presidential election cycle.

Election officials across Arizona required proof of citizenship for some voters but not others, depending on whether they registered using the state or federal form. Election workers had to be trained in the dual system. And it forced some voters to cast provisional ballots, which are held aside and counted only after they are verified. Several races weren't decided for days as election workers counted thousands of provisional ballots.

"It caused a great confusion out there, because you could have two people coming in and if they grabbed the state form, you told them, 'You have to fill it out completely.' Yet if they picked up the national form, even if some information was missing, we had to take it," Pima County Recorder F. Ann Rodriguez, a Democrat, told The Arizona Republic. "I told Attorney General Tom Horne, 'This is what you get for having a bunch of damn lawyers arguing a point who don't understand our process. … Tell us to do all A or all B.'"

The confusion could continue. If opponents of the law win, the most extreme ramification could be that conservative state lawmakers, seeking to continue proof-of- citizenship requirements for state and local elections, set in stone a complicated dual-election system.

In that case, voters who register on the state form using citizenship documentation could be allowed to vote in all races -- for local, state and federal offices. But voters who use the federal form and don't show documentation might be restricted to only federal elections -- that is, for Congress and president.

Federal-form voters might walk into their polling place, look at their ballots and wonder why they see no boxes for the mayor's race, for example.

On the other hand, if the state prevails, Arizonans registering to vote might continue to be confused -- or hampered -- by having to show proof of citizenship.

A Native American woman born at home on the reservation and a grandmother born in 1910, before her state began issuing birth records, for instance, testified that they lacked birth certificates required to register to vote. And groups that conduct voter-registration drives said it was difficult to sign up new voters, like college students, who lacked the right documentation or didn't have it with them.

Sam Wercinski, executive director of the Arizona Advocacy Network, one of the lawsuit's plaintiffs, said far more eligible Arizona voters are rejected under Arizona's law than the number of non-citizens caught illegally registering to vote.

"Let's have the scales of justice put out here. Which way are they going to tilt? Who's being affected more?" he said.

Voter fraud among issues

Supporters of Arizona's law are hoping the Supreme Court case will finally muzzle the opposition.

"This is a big moment," said Randy Pullen, architect of the 2004 campaign for the law and a former chairman of the Arizona Republican Party. "That's why we put it on the ballot to begin with. We hoped that it would become the cornerstone … and set a precedent to allow states to do similar things."

Four states -- Georgia, Alabama, Kansas and Tennessee -- have passed similar laws requiring proof of citizenship for voter registration, and at least 12 have considered it.

"That law basically changed the entire immigration debate in the country. It did exactly what we wanted it to do," Pullen said.

He believes the court should uphold Arizona's tougher voter-registration requirements because lower courts have found the potential harm to voters did not outweigh the state's need to protect election integrity.

Horne argues that election fraud would go unchecked without the proof-of-citizenship law. The lawsuit also includes Arizona Secretary of State Ken Bennett and 13 of the state's 15 counties.

The federal form is "an honor system that has no real protection," said Horne. "Someone who is willing to vote fraudulently would be willing to sign falsely. … Particularly in a state that is on the (U.S.-Mexican) border … we need information to confirm (that people registering to vote) are in fact citizens."

County prosecutors have few resources to go after election fraud, Horne said. Under the law, he said, election officials can catch fraud before it occurs. And that's a precaution the state has the authority to impose, he said.

Arizona has charged or prosecuted 19 non-citizens for illegally registering to vote since the law took effect in 2005 and kicked more than 200 off the voter rolls after they marked that they were non-citizens on jury-duty forms, according to state election officials. Some violators said they didn't know they shouldn't register, and critics have questioned whether actual citizens checked the non-citizen box just to get out of jury duty.

But if Arizona fails to prevent non-citizens from voting, eligible voters could lose trust in the election system and decline to participate in elections, Horne said. And close elections could be determined by a small number of fraudulent ballots, Horne says.

"If everybody knows it's easy to cheat the system, it diminishes their view of the system," he said. In passing Proposition 200, "Arizona acted reasonably."

Court's possible ruling

The case sets up a "state's rights" challenge to Congress' election authority.

Voting-rights advocates, who have been contesting the law almost since it was passed, argue that Arizona's requirements add barriers to voter registration that Congress intended to prevent. The federal form created through the National Voter Registration Act was meant to be accepted by all states as an easy way to register.

Bob Kengle, an attorney who represents several plaintiffs through the Washington, D.C.-based Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, said Congress settled the question of whether people should be required to show citizenship documents as part of the federal voter-registration process.

Members of Congress deleted that requirement in the bill, saying it would "seriously interfere" with the ease of mail voter registration.

But "the legislative history makes clear Congress was very aware of protecting against voter fraud," Kengle said. "It's like baseball and apple pie. Nobody will argue elections should lack integrity."

So Congress established federal criminal penalties for intentionally registering falsely, required the federal voter-registration form to display clear instructions not to register as a non-citizen and made voters sign under oath.

That should be sufficient, Kengle said. "The state thinks it has a better idea."

Daniel Tokaji, an Ohio State University election-law expert, believes the case against Arizona's law is nearly ironclad.

"There is precious little evidence of voter fraud," Tokaji said. "If you're not a citizen, you'd have to be crazy or ignorant of the law to go vote, because you're taking a huge risk for relatively little benefit. You could go to jail, lose any chance you have of gaining citizenship or even be risking deportation. Why would you take the chance of illegally voting?"

"In my view," Tokaji said, "this will be very hard for Arizona to win."

Levitt, the Yale elections-law expert, added that the Supreme Court is unlikely to rule Arizona's election power supersedes the federal government's, which could undermine the Constitution and threaten a host of federal election laws.

Attorneys from the Department of Justice have also weighed in against Arizona's law, arguing that Congress' power holds sway.

But Horne argues that Arizona's law does not conflict with Congress' election powers. The state's responsibility is verifying the eligibility of voters, he says.

When Arizona demands proof of citizenship with a voter-registration form, Horne says, it's like an airline requiring identification to confirm a traveler's ticket to board a plane. The airline isn't rejecting the ticket, rather it's verifying that the ticket belongs to the traveler.

Tokaji remains skeptical that Arizona's law could be duplicated around the country. These days, Republicans don't need the political fight, he said.

"This perceived immigrant bashing has had a negative effect on the Republican Party's electoral prospects," Tokaji said. "The last thing the Republican Party wants to do right now is to alienate Latino and, to a lesser extent, Asian- American, voters in the way voter- identification laws tend to do."

But Pullen, the law's campaign architect, remains confident Arizona will win.

"It's almost like if you have to lift one finger to register to vote, that somehow that's wrong," he said. "I think most Americans would reject that argument."

Gonzalez says he is hopeful would-be voters in Arizona will have an easier path to the ballot box.

"As U.S. citizens, we should all have the same rights, despite our country of origin," he told a federal judge. "I have paid taxes all my life, and have contributed to this country. I want to vote. I want to exercise this right because I feel that it is the best method to improve the lives of people in the United States, particularly Latino people.

"I hope that the law that I am challenging in Arizona will not be in effect in the future."

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Medicaid After the Supreme Court Decision

Last week there were two disturbing reports about Medicaid, a program of health insurance for the poor that is mostly managed by the states and jointly paid for by the federal and state governments. The Congressional Budget Office predicted that states with a large number of poor people would not expand their Medicaid programs as required by the health care reform law now that the Supreme Court had made expansion optional. And a Harvard study unrelated to the court decision made it clear that a failure to expand Medicaid would likely doom thousands of low-income people to death or poor health.

Revising earlier estimates to take account of the decision, the budget office said that making expanded assistance optional could leave three million more people uninsured in 2022, saving the federal government $84 billion through 2022 because it would not have to subsidize their coverage.

The analysts made no effort to predict which states would or would not expand Medicaid. Instead, they looked at various factors that might influence the states’ decisions and predicted that some would not respond to even the extremely generous matching money that the reform law provided.

They forecast that some states that already had trouble paying for their existing Medicaid programs would put off expanding Medicaid until their economies improved, or would expand the program partially, not to the extent originally required. Other states may shun the program entirely, as some Republican governors have vowed to do. By 2022, the budget office projects, only two-thirds of those who would become newly eligible for Medicaid if all states expanded to the levels sought by the reform law will actually gain eligibility. One-third will not, either because their states refuse to expand Medicaid at all or expand it only partially.

Leaving low-income people uninsured will almost certainly damage their health. A study by three researchers affiliated with the Harvard School of Public Health, published by The New England Journal of Medicine, compared three states (New York, Arizona and Maine) that had already expanded coverage of childless or disabled adults with four neighboring states (Pennsylvania, New Mexico, Nevada and New Hampshire) that had not. Deaths among people ages 20 to 64 dropped in the three expansion states by about 1,500 a year, adjusted for population growth, whereas death rates in the comparison states went up. Expansion also brought a 21 percent reduction in cost-related delays in getting care.

Some critics, mostly conservative Republicans, contend that Medicaid does not improve the health of beneficiaries and may even harm them. The new study should lay that canard to rest. State officials who want to save money by not expanding Medicaid will be harming their most vulnerable residents, and will most likely shift the cost of any emergency care they need to safety net institutions, taxpayers and charities.

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Romney Campaign Unleashes Coordinated Response to Court Ruling

Moments after the Supreme Court ruled on President Obama’s health care law, Lanhee Chen, the policy director for Mitt Romney, sent an e-mail to about three dozen senior Republicans on Capitol Hill and in state attorneys general’s offices.

“Please stand by. Reviewing. Will circulate answer,” the e-mail, sent at 10:17 a.m. said in part.

Minutes later, at 10:27 a.m., Mr. Chen sent another e-mail: “Go with upheld.”

Those three words unleashed a public relations plan that was nine weeks in the making and designed to make sure that the Republican response to whatever the court decided served Mr. Romney’s presidential ambitions.

“Everyone at the table understood the importance of this decision,” said Sean Spicer, the communications director for the Republican National Committee, which coordinated the planning. “The only way we were ever going to get rid of Obamacare is if we are committed to electing Governor Romney.”

For more than two months, a group of top aides to Mr. Romney met weekly with staff members to Republican lawmakers, legislative campaign committees and representatives of the state attorneys general. The meetings, led by Jeff Larson, the chief of staff at the Republican National Committee, were usually held at 3 p.m. in a conference room on the fourth floor of the committee’s headquarters.

The group developed three scenarios. Scenario One assumed the court had upheld the health care law. Scenario Two assumed the court had overturned it. Scenario Three contemplated a variety of partial rulings.

In each case, the group developed separate statements, Twitter hashtags, videos and Web sites. Mr. Spicer said there were spirited discussions (many hashtag suggestions were discarded, for example) as the group debated how to respond.

But in all cases, it was agreed that Mr. Romney, the presumptive Republican nominee, was in charge of the message.

“Everybody was going to take their cue from Governor Romney,” Mr. Spicer said.

On Thursday morning, communications and policy aides from Capitol Hill and from Mr. Romney’s Boston headquarters convened in a first-floor conference room at the Republican National Committee that had been turned into a war-room. A large monitor was running TweetDeck. The group watched the initial, confusing reports about the court’s decision.

Then, they waited for Mr. Chen’s e-mail.

“Once Lanhee gave the green light, we were hitting our state parties, our surrogates,” Mr. Spicer said. The minute the e-mail arrived, Scenario One went into operation.

The surrogate list, developed over weeks, included dozens of state and national Republican officials, booked onto television and radio programs from morning to night. The switch was thrown on a Web site: peoplevobamacare.com. Republican officials everywhere started posting on Twitter with the agreed-upon hashtag: #fullrepeal.

The plan was originally designed for a Monday implementation, Mr. Spicer said (the court’s last scheduled day of the term). He said it will be compressed a bit because of the Thursday decision.

And what about Scenarios One and Two? “We had mapped out every conceivable scenario,” Mr. Spicer said.

But he’s not saying anything much about those.

Follow Michael D. Shear on Twitter at @shearm.

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Supreme Court hears arguments over Ariz. immigration law

WASHINGTON – U.S. Supreme Court justices spent more than an hour Wednesday delving into Arizona's new immigration law, raising questions about the state's ability to implement federal immigration policy, how much power Arizona has to police its own borders, and how U.S. citizens and legal immigrants could be affected by the law.

By Jack Gruber, USA TODAY

Opponents of Arizona's immigration law rally outside of the United States Supreme Court during arguments Wednesday.

By Jack Gruber, USA TODAY

Opponents of Arizona's immigration law rally outside of the United States Supreme Court during arguments Wednesday.

The justices took sharp aim at a portion of the law that requires police officers to determine the immigration status of suspects they've stopped, detained or arrested if a "reasonable suspicion" exists that the person is in the country illegally.

U.S. Solicitor General Donald Verrilli argued that forcing all of Arizona's local officers to request so many immigration checks would overwhelm federal officials, and interfere with the federal government's approach of focusing its efforts on the most dangerous illegal immigrants.

Chief Justice John Roberts questioned why the federal government would not want a state to assist in identifying illegal immigrants.

"It seems to me that the federal government just doesn't want to know who is here illegally or not," Roberts said.

The Supreme Court will decide on four provisions of Arizona's anti-illegal immigration law, known as SB 1070, that have been blocked by federal courts. They are:

Section 2(B): Requires state and local police to perform roadside immigration checks of people they've stopped or detained if a "reasonable suspicion" exists they are in the country illegally.

Section 3: Makes it a state crime for illegal immigrants not to possess their federal registration cards.

Section 5(C): Makes it a state crime for illegal immigrants to work, apply for work or solicit work in any way, including making a "gesture or nod" indicating they are looking for work.

Section 6: Allows state and local police to arrest illegal immigrants without a warrant when probable cause exists that they committed "any public offense that makes the person removable from the United States."

Source: USA TODAY research

The questioning grew so intense that Justice Sonia Sotomayor, one of the liberal justices on the court, told Verrilli to move on to another section. "You can see it's not selling very well," she said.

Kris Kobach, Kansas' secretary of State who has helped Arizona and other states write laws cracking down on illegal immigration, attended Wednesday's hearing and said he was surprised at how forcefully the majority of the justices seemed to attack the U.S. government's position.

"Arizona had a good day today," he said.

Karen Tumlin, managing attorney for the National Immigration Law Center, which has sued Arizona and other states over their immigration laws, came out of Wednesday's hearing and said it's "foolhardy" to try to predict the way the Supreme Court justices will rule based on their questions.

"The justices had a lot of questions about … what's going to be the everyday life of people living under this law," she said. "We're hopeful."

Arizona Senate Bill 1070, which passed in 2010, has become a flashpoint for the debate over how to enforce immigration in the U.S. and served as a blueprint for five other states that later adopted similar laws.

Four key provisions were blocked by a federal judge before the law took effect, leading to Wednesday's hearing before the Supreme Court. The cramped courtroom was filled for the oral arguments that lasted more than an hour. Arizona Republican Gov. Jan Brewer and the law's architect, former Arizona state Senate president Russell Pearce, sat near civil rights attorneys who have battled the state over the law for the past two years.

Justice Antonin Scalia repeatedly asked why Arizona should be barred from policing its own state. After Verrilli argued that the Constitution grants the federal government exclusive powers to enforce immigration in the country, Scalia fired back.

By Jack Gruber, USA TODAY

Supporters of Arizona SB 1070 rally outside the United States Supreme Court on Wednesday.

"If, in fact, somebody who does not belong in this country is in Arizona, Arizona has no power?" Scalia asked. "What does sovereignty mean if it does not include the ability to defend your borders?"

Meanwhile, Justices Sotomayor, Stephen Breyer and Anthony Kennedy asked Arizona's attorneys whether the new law would unnecessarily prolong traffic stops and arrests of legal residents and U.S. citizens.

Dozens of protesters for and against the law rallied at the base of the court steps as police kept watch over the growing crowd.

Opponents of the law chanted "Hey ho, 1070 has got to go!" Members of church groups held a large sign that read "Standing on the side of love."

A smaller group of people supporting the law from the American Council of Immigration Reform held signs proclaiming "Thank you Arizona" and "SB1070 supports federal immigration law, President Obama doesn't."

Sponsors said the law was necessary because the federal government has failed to control the influx of illegal immigrants into the country, forcing states such as Arizona to grapple with the security concerns and high costs of educating and caring for illegal immigrants. They said the law simply empowered police and state officials to help enforce federal immigration laws.

Opponents said it unfairly criminalizes otherwise law-abiding people, opens the door for racial profiling of Hispanics legally in the country and forces state law enforcement to interfere with the intricacies of federal immigration policy.

Jim Shee, 73, of Phoenix, was among a group of Arizonans opposed to the law that held a press conference Wednesday in front of the court building before arguments began.

Shee, a U.S. citizen and a plaintiff against SB 1070, said he was stopped twice by law enforcement officers in Arizona in April 2010 while driving. He said he was asked for his papers and told he was stopped for looking suspicious.

"Unless SB 1070 is struck down, I fear I will continue to face racial profiling and discrimination by the state of Arizona simply because of my race and the way I look," he said.

Cochise County (Ariz.) Sheriff Larry Dever is a strong supporter of the law, and came out of the courtroom upbeat. He said the law provides critical tools for his deputies to combat illegal immigration in his county, and was pleased by what he heard on Wednesday.

"It's hard to read the justices, but I think we outshone the opposition by quite a bit," he said.

The court is expected to rule by June on the four provisions of the law:

•Section 2(B): Requires state and local police to perform roadside immigration checks of people they've stopped or detained if a "reasonable suspicion" exists they are in the country illegally.

•Section 3: Makes it a state crime for illegal immigrants not to possess their federal registration cards.

•Section 5(C): Makes it a state crime for illegal immigrants to work, apply for work or solicit work in any way, including making a "gesture or nod" indicating they are looking for work.

•Section 6: Allows state and local police to arrest illegal immigrants without a warrant when probable cause exists that they committed "any public offense that makes the person removable from the United States."

The ruling could have far-reaching effects on the future of state efforts to combat illegal immigration, the daily lives of the nation's 11 million illegal immigrants and, to some degree, the outcome of November's presidential election.

Alabama, Georgia, South Carolina, Indiana and Utah passed laws in 2011 that mirrored Arizona's law. The enforcement provisions of those laws have been put on hold by federal judges, so the Supreme Court's decision will affect the fate of all those laws.

The expected June court ruling will raise the immigration debate just as the presidential debate kicks into the home stretch. With President Obama's re-election campaign and the Republican Party both launching their Hispanic outreach programs last week to reach an expected 12 million Hispanic voters, the ruling could energize voters on one, or both, sides of the debate.

Obama has called the Arizona law "misguided" and his Department of Justice sued the state. Mitt Romney, the former Massachusetts governor and likely GOP presidential nominee, has embraced some of Arizona's efforts to combat illegal immigration and adopted the Arizona-inspired idea of making life so difficult for illegal immigrants that they choose to "self-deport."

The law's stated goal for the roughly 400,000 illegal immigrants living in Arizona is "attrition through enforcement" and aims to "discourage and deter the unlawful entry and presence of aliens."

Immediately after the law's passage, an untold number of illegal immigrants fled the state. Protests sprang up from Phoenix to Chicago and the state was boycotted by a variety of entities.

Despite the vocal criticism, the law was viewed favorably by the people most closely affected by it: Arizonans. Sixty-four percent of residents supported the law, according to a Rasmussen poll conducted shortly after the bill was signed into law.

National polls also showed that a majority of Americans — 55% — supported Arizona's efforts, according to a Quinnipiac University poll taken shortly after the law was passed.

Arizona officials, including Brewer, have long insisted that SB 1070 is not an attack on Hispanics. The bill's authors have pointed out that the law prohibits officers from engaging in racial profiling, and Brewer said she went to great lengths to ensure that the law did not violate any civil rights.

"I was born in the Southwest. I grew up in the Southwest, and anybody that has lived here knows what diversity is. It's not like all of a sudden we wake up one day and we're bigots," Brewer said. "We go to school with a diverse population, in our churches, they marry into our families. But if you want to shut down debate, what do you do? You throw out the race card."

Contributing: Erin Kelly in Washington; Carolyn Pesce in McLean, Va.

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Supreme Court weighs fate of Arizona's immigration law

WASHINGTON – Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer said she didn't know what she was starting when she signed her name to the state's landmark immigration bill just over two years ago.

2010 photo by Ralph Freso, AP

Edward Pina protests Arizona's SB1070 immigration-enforcement law in Phoenix.

2010 photo by Ralph Freso, AP

Edward Pina protests Arizona's SB1070 immigration-enforcement law in Phoenix.

"I knew that it was going to be momentous, but to this extent, I had no realization," Brewer said.

On Wednesday, she will be sitting in the gallery of the U.S. Supreme Court as the justices consider the fate of Arizona Senate Bill 1070, which was considered the toughest state immigration enforcement law to date and served as the blueprint for five other states that followed suit the next year.

Supporters of the law say it was necessary because the federal government has failed to control the influx of illegal immigrants into the country, forcing states like Arizona to grapple with the security concerns and high costs of educating and caring for illegal immigrants.

Opponents say it unfairly criminalizes otherwise law-abiding people, opens the door for racial profiling of Hispanics legally in the country and forces state law enforcement to interfere with the intricacies of federal immigration policy.

By John Moore, Getty Images

Supporters of Arizona's immigration law SB1070 rallied at the state capitol building on July 31, 2010.

The Supreme Court's ruling, expected in June, could have far-reaching effects on the future of state efforts to combat illegal immigration, the daily lives of the nation's 11 million illegal immigrants and, to some degree, the outcome of November's presidential election.

"This is the most important immigration case in a generation," said Warren Stewart, senior pastor at the First Institutional Baptist Church in Phoenix.

The Supreme Court will decide on four provisions of Arizona's anti-illegal immigration law, known as SB 1070, that have been blocked by federal courts. They are:

Section 2(B): Requires state and local police to perform roadside immigration checks of people they've stopped or detained if a "reasonable suspicion" exists they are in the country illegally.

Section 3: Makes it a state crime for illegal immigrants not to possess their federal registration cards.

Section 5(C): Makes it a state crime for illegal immigrants to work, apply for work or solicit work in any way, including making a "gesture or nod" indicating they are looking for work.

Section 6: Allows state and local police to arrest illegal immigrants without a warrant when probable cause exists that they committed "any public offense that makes the person removable from the United States."

Source: USA TODAY research

Just a month after the court entered into the legal thicket that is health care in America, the justices will be taking up one of the nation's most vexing, political and cultural issues. Once again, the courthouse steps are expected to be crammed with people supporting both sides of the debate. The two gladiators of the health care debate will face off in a packed courtoom: U.S. Solicitor General Donald Verrilli will argue for the federal government, and former solicitor general Paul Clement will defend Arizona.

This time, the court will be missing Justice Elena Kagan, who recused herself presumably because of her work as solicitor general under President Obama. That sets up the potential for a 4-4 tie, which would give the U.S. a victory since the injunction originally imposed by U.S. District Judge Susan Bolton in Phoenix, and upheld by the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco, would stand.

The case is the culmination of growing frustration in states over the inability of Washington to agree on a way to handle the country's illegal immigrants — a consensus not reached since the Reagan administration. That has resulted in a complex web of state laws that have gone in wildly different directions.

By Tom Tingle, The Arizona Republic, via AP

Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer said she didn’t know what she was starting when she signed her name onto the state’s landmark immigration bill just over two years ago.

Since Arizona passed SB 1070, Alabama adopted the toughest-in-the-nation mantle with its immigration law that required K-12 school officials to check the immigration status of all new students. On the other end of the spectrum, Rhode Island joined 12 other states that allow illegal immigrants to receive in-state college tuition. And somewhere in between, Utah adopted a law that adopts Arizona-style enforcement, but also provides for a permit for some illegal immigrants to legally work in the state.

A June court ruling will raise the immigration debate just as the presidential debate kicks into the home stretch. And with Obama's re-election campaign and the Republican Party both launching their Hispanic outreach programs last week to reach an expected 12 million Hispanic voters, the ruling could energize voters on one, or both, sides of the debate.

Obama's immigration record as president has been mixed. His administration has set records each year for the number of people it deports — nearly 400,000 last year. But it has focused deportation efforts on illegal immigrants who are convicted criminals, resulting in the highest percentage of deportees having criminal records last year (about 55%) in a decade.

Mitt Romney, the former Massachusetts governor and likely Republican nominee, has called Arizona's efforts to combat illegal immigration by cracking down on businesses who hire them — but not the whole law — "a model" for the nation. He has also embraced the Arizona-inspired idea of making life so difficult for illegal immigrants that they choose to "self-deport."

A victory in Arizona v. United States would solidify either candidate's argument, but could inspire severe backlash, or support, from the ever-growing Hispanic electorate.

"It will be a seismic shift in the Latino community," said Angela Kelley of the Center for American Progress, which opposes the Arizona law. "It will be known to every Latino in this country."

Bob Dane of the Federation for American Immigration Reform, which supports Arizona's law, said a victory for the U.S. would be a tragic endorsement of Obama's "we won't and you can't" immigration policy and fire up supporters of the state efforts.

"That will weigh heavily on voters' minds," Dane said.

Years in the making

Arizona's 2010 immigration law may have caught many by surprise, but the state had been heading in that direction for years.

In 2004, Arizona voters passed Proposition 200, which barred illegal immigrants from receiving public benefits. The state passed an anti-human-smuggling act in 2005 to allow prosecutors to charge border-crossers with state crimes. And in 2007, Arizona passed a law aimed at denying work for illegal immigrants. All three laws were challenged by civil rights groups, but all were upheld by federal courts.

Then came Senate Bill 1070.

The law's stated goal for the roughly 400,000 illegal immigrants living in Arizona is "attrition through enforcement" and aims to "discourage and deter the unlawful entry and presence of aliens." The law expanded the requirements for local and state police to check the immigration status of people, and created new state crimes punishing illegal immigrants.

Immediately after the law's passage, an untold number of illegal immigrants fled the state. Protests sprang up from Phoenix to Chicago.

The state was boycotted by a wide variety of entities, including the National Council of La Raza, the cities of Los Angeles, St. Paul and Boston, musicians including Rage Against the Machine and Kanye West, and even the Highland Park (Ill.) High School women's basketball team, which pulled out of a tournament in Scottsdale.

Activists unsuccessfully tried to get Major League Baseball to move the 2011 All-Star Game from Phoenix. The outcry grew so loud that some called for a boycott of AriZona Iced Tea, prompting the company to issue a statement reminding customers that they were still based in New York.

The Center for American Progress, which opposes Arizona's immigration efforts, estimated that the tourism-dependent state would lose an estimated $388 million over three years as as result of the boycotts and negative publicity the law generated.

The Department of Justice joined a group of civil rights organizations in lawsuits seeking to halt the law from going into effect. At that time, in April 2010, President Obama called the law "misguided" and said the provisions "threaten to undermine basic notions of fairness that we cherish as Americans."

Despite the vocal criticism, the law was viewed favorably by the people most closely affected by it: Arizonans. Sixty-four percent of residents supported the law, according to a Rasmussen poll conducted shortly after the bill was signed into law.

National polls also showed that a majority of Americans supported Arizona's efforts — 55% of Americans approved Arizona's law shortly after it was passed, according to a Quinnipiac University poll.

On July 28, 2010, the day before the law was set to go into effect, U.S. District Judge Susan Bolton blocked the main portions of the law from going into effect, starting the appeals process that led it to the Supreme Court.

Portions of law enforced

Still, Carlos Garcia, a 29-year-old native of Mexico who lives in Phoenix, said the remaining portions of the law, combined with those passed before it, have created a culture of fear in the state for both legal and illegal immigrants.

Garcia is a U.S. citizen, but he says most of his relatives are illegal immigrants. In the two years since SB 1070 went into effect, four of his relatives have been arrested — two have been deported, two remain in the country.

"There's this perception that everything is OK because 1070 is enjoined," Garcia said. "But people continue to be racially profiled, continue to be detained, continue to be deported."

Phoenix police Sgt. Trent Crump said his agency is definitely enforcing the remaining portions of the law.

For example, Phoenix police used to prevent its officers from investigating the immigration status of crime victims and witnesses. Crump said the department was forced to remove that restriction because another portion of SB 1070 allows citizens to sue government agencies, including police departments, if they are enforcing federal immigration laws "to less than the full extent permitted by federal law."

The penalty is up to $5,000 a day.

"1070 doesn't allow a lot of interpretation," Crump said.

Russell McClurg, a barber in Apache Junction, Ariz., said the law is needed because the federal government had ignored the financial and security burdens thrust upon the state by an open border with Mexico.

"The only ones who seem to be sticking up for Arizonans are the Arizonans," said McClurg, 72. "You'd think the federal government would be more help, but they seem more interested in fighting us."

The clearest image of that battle came when Obama visited Arizona in January and met Brewer on the tarmac, where photographs showed the Republican governor pointing her finger at the president. Brewer later downplayed the scene, but her office has strongly defended the state's economic recovery since the immigration law was passed.

As of February, the state had added 42,6000 new, non-farm jobs over the previous year, and state revenues have increased 8.7% so far in 2012. The Arizona Office of Tourism found the state generated $17.7 billion in direct travel spending in 2010 — a 7.9% increase over the previous year. Brewer said there may have been a negative effect in the immediate aftermath of the law, but that the state has rebounded and the "Arizona comeback" is here.

"Businesses are coming. People are recruiting," Brewer said. "We should get a lot of kudos for what we've accomplished."

Arguments before high court

When the case goes before the Supreme Court, the justices will not be ruling on the entire law, but four provisions that were blocked.

That includes portions requiring police to check the immigration status of people during traffic stops and creating state crimes for illegal immigrants failing to carry proof of immigration or trying to solicit work.

In court filings, Arizona argues that the federal government has failed to adequately secure the border from illegal crossers, and that Arizona is bearing the brunt of that failure. The state says a third of the immigrants illegally crossing into the U.S. did so through Arizona and the "accompanying influx of illegal drugs, dangerous criminals and highly vulnerable persons, have resulted in massive problems for Arizona's citizens and government."

Arizona argues that it's not going beyond federal immigration laws, but only assisting the feds carry out their laws. Arizona attorneys point out that it's a federal misdemeanor for illegal immigrants to not possess their federal registration cards, and that creating a state law for the same crime is merely an attempt to help federal officials implement that law.

The Department of Justice counters that the federal government has gone to great lengths to crack down on illegal immigration. President Obama, continuing the policies of his predecessors, has continued funding enforcement along the Southwest border, resulting in more than 4,000 Border Patrol agents, 350 Immigration and Customs Enforcement special agents and 40 Department of Homeland Security aircraft in Arizona alone.

And while some of the new Arizona laws may mirror federal laws, Justice attorneys argue that state and local police officers are not properly trained to implement them. Requiring them to understand complex federal immigration policies is unwise, they argue, and errors could lead to foreign relations problems.

"As the Framers understood, it is the National Government that has ultimate responsibility to regulate the treatment of aliens while on American soil, because it is the Nation as a whole — not any single State — that must respond to the international consequences of such treatment," the government's brief reads.

Predicting how the court rules could come down to a question of precedent versus politics, said Erwin Chemerinsky, dean of the University of California-Irvine School of Law.

Chemerinsky said the U.S. should prevail if the justices stick to court precedent. He points to a 1941 case, Hines v. Davidowitz, where the court struck down a Pennsylvania immigration law that bears similarities to Arizona's, including the requirement that immigrants carry federal registration papers. The court ruled that immigration enforcement requires important foreign policy considerations, meaning states could not "conflict" or "complement" federal immigration efforts.

"If I just predicted based on law, SB 1070 should be deemed preempted and it should be a lopsided decision," Chemerinsky said. "But the politics are so intense and the Court is conservative."

Kris Kobach, the secretary of state of Kansas who has helped Arizona and other states craft their anti-illegal immigrant laws, disagrees with that assessment. He points out that Arizona is three-for-three in defending its recent laws in courts, and said that of all the laws, SB 1070 stands on the strongest Constitutional grounds.

He points to a 1976 Supreme Court ruling in De Canas v. Bica, in which the justices upheld a California law that created criminal sanctions against state employers who hired illegal immigrants. That precedent was backed up just last year, when the court ruled 5-3 in Chamber of Commerce v. Whiting that Arizona could restrict business licenses for companies that knowingly hired illegal immigrants.

"What the court laid out was a roadmap," Kobach said of the De Canas v. Bica ruling. "If there's no conflict with any federal statue … then the state action is perfectly fine."

A debate over civil rights?

While the justices are expected to rule strictly on the four provisions in the law, many are viewing the case as a barometer of civil rights in America today.

"Despite the fact that this is, on legal terms, about the structure of government and specifically federal supremacy and the relationship between states and the federal government … this is clearly a civil rights case," said Thomas Saenz, president of the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund, which is one of the groups that sued Arizona.

Arizona officials, including Brewer, have long insisted that SB 1070 is not an attack on Hispanics. The bill's authors have pointed out that the law specifically prohibits officers from engaging in racial profiling.

Brewer said she went to great lengths to ensure that SB 1070 did not violate any civil rights and expressly forbade racial profiling. She said the reaction by some, where she and Arizona legislators have been branded as racists, has led to many sleepless nights.

"I was born in the Southwest. I grew up in the Southwest, and anybody that has lived here knows what diversity is. It's not like all of a sudden we wake up one day and we're bigots," Brewer said. "We go to school with a diverse population, in our churches, they marry into our families — but if you want to shut down debate, what do you do? You throw out the race card."

Kobach considers the Supreme Court case his "final exam." Kobach, as a law professor at the University of Missouri-Kansas City and in his current role as a Kansas state official, has helped states write and implement anti-illegal immigration laws around the country.

Kobach helped Arizona legislators craft the three previous immigration bills that have survived judicial scrutiny. And now he sees the ruling on SB 1070 as the final piece.

If the court rules in Arizona's favor, then it will "vindicate the work I've been doing for many years."

If not?

"Then I'll have to go back to the drawing board," he said.

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Mississippi high court says some pardons by former governor valid

STARKVILLE, Mississippi (Reuters) - Ten pardons granted to prisoners by former Mississippi Governor Haley Barbour just before he left office are valid and should be carried out, a divided Mississippi Supreme Court ruled on Thursday.

Mississippi Attorney General Jim Hood had asked the court to void those pardons, among some 200 issued by the former Republican governor in January, on the grounds that technical procedures set out in the state constitution had not been met.

But the state Supreme Court ruled 6 to 3 that it could not set aside the contested pardons based solely on Hood's claim that the prisoners had failed to meet an obscure provision requiring felons seeking a pardon to publish the request in a newspaper 30 days in advance.

Hood, a Democrat, was not able to show that any of the pardons were invalid on their face, presiding Justice Jess H. Dickinson wrote in the majority opinion.

Like many states, Mississippi allows its governor to issue pardons with virtual impunity. Lawyers for the people pardoned had argued the court did not have the authority to overturn the pardons.

"At the outset, we wish to state that this case is not about whether the governor is above the law," Dickinson wrote. "He clearly is not..."

"We are compelled to hold that - in each of the cases before us - it fell to the governor alone to decide whether the Constitution's publication requirement was met," Dickinson said.

The 10 people who received the contested pardons were all prisoners at the time. Five had worked at the governor's mansion doing odd jobs, and four of those five inmates were serving life sentences for murder.

Half of the 10 remain behind bars due to a temporary restraining order that kept them imprisoned while Hood's challenge was under review.

The court vacated the restraining order on Thursday, but it was unclear when the prisoners would be released.

A spokeswoman for the state Department of Corrections said it must notify local law enforcement, prosecutors and any registered victims 48 hours before releasing the inmates.

The cases at issue in the legal challenge were not the only pardons by Barbour, a former Republican National Committee chairman, to spark controversy.

About two-thirds of the pardons were to whites and a third to blacks. Mississippi's prison population is roughly the reverse, two-thirds black and a third white.

One of the people pardoned was the brother of former National Football League quarterback Brett Favre. Earnest Scott Favre was convicted in 1996 of driving while intoxicated after a vehicle he was driving crashed and killed his best friend.

Favre was not in prison at the time of his pardon.

In a statement on Thursday, Barbour applauded the court's decision to uphold the governor's right to exercise not only clemency but also mercy.

"As I've stated from the beginning, I recognize and respect the natural feelings of victims and their families and I know this has been difficult for many of them," Barbour said.

"Nevertheless, these were decisions based on repentance, rehabilitation, and redemption, leading to forgiveness and the right defined and given by the state constitution to the governor to offer such people a second chance."

Hood said he would seek to change the constitution to require courts to enforce the 30-day notification policy in the future. He did not say whether he would challenge more of Barbour's pardons as he previously had indicated he would do.

"We do respect the decision of the Court, but feel deeply for how it must weigh on the victims and their families," Hood said in a statement on Thursday. "It is these victims and family members who have lost today and the criminals who have won."

The ruling shows the state's high court will not "police" other branches of government on procedural requirements, said Matthew Steffey, a constitutional law professor at Mississippi College who has followed the case.

"I believe the majority opinion is more faithful to constitutional history, precedent and theory," he said. "It's a principle of separation of powers."

(Writing by Colleen Jenkins; Editing by Greg McCune; Desking by Eric Walsh)

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GOP rivals hope to court Cain supporters (AP)

WASHINGTON – A day after Herman Cain shuttered his Republican candidacy for president, struggling GOP hopefuls looked to pick up the fallen candidate's tea party following and upset a primary dynamic that has pushed Mitt Romney and Newt Gingrich to the forefront.

Gingrich's campaign, ramping up its operations in early nominating states, was meeting with former Cain aides and advisers now looking for jobs. While Cain's endorsement remained up for grabs, Gingrich and his rivals were looking to schedule one-on-one meetings this week with the former pizza executive.

Reps. Ron Paul of Texas and Michele Bachmann of Minnesota said Sunday they expected Cain supporters would fall in line behind them because of their messages on limited government, despite their low standing in the polls. Meanwhile, last-place rival Rick Santorum predicted he now had a good chance of winning the Iowa caucus.

While such brazen predictions are probably overstated, the 11th-hour press comes at a crucial time and could upset an already volatile race for the GOP endorsement. A month before the first vote is cast in the Iowa caucus and five weeks before the New Hampshire primary, most GOP candidates were looking to a week of heavy campaigning in Iowa ahead of the next debate, scheduled for Saturday. The stakes are possibly the highest for Mitt Romney, who could be hurt the worst if Cain supporters rally behind Gingrich.

"A lot of Herman Cain supporters have been calling our office and they've been coming over to our side," said Bachmann. "They saw Herman Cain as an outsider and I think they see that my voice would be the one that would be most reflective of his."

Likewise, Paul said he was optimistic that Cain's departure would reinvigorate his campaign.

"We're paying a lot of attention to that, because obviously they're going to go somewhere in the next week or so," Paul said of Cain's supporters.

Santorum predicted that his campaign would pick up steam in coming days.

"We have a very strong, consistent conservative message that matches up better with Iowans than anybody else. And we think we're going to surprise a lot of people," he said.

Once surging in the polls, Cain dropped out of the race Saturday after battling allegations of sexual harassment and a claim that he had a 13-year extramarital affair. The Georgia businessman has denied the accusations.

Gingrich, the former House speaker from Georgia, has so far been the biggest beneficiary of Cain's slide. A Des Moines Register poll conducted Nov. 27-30 and released late Saturday found the former House speaker leading the GOP field with 25 percent support, ahead of Paul at 18 percent and Romney at 16.

A separate NBC News/Marist poll showed Gingrich beating Romney, 26 percent to 18 percent, among Republican caucus attendees in Iowa.

Gingrich also is enjoying national popularity that could give him the momentum he needs to overcome deficiencies in the organization of his campaign. At the same time, Gingrich says he knows his surge in the polls could disappear if his opponents stage a comeback.

"I'm not going to say that any of my friends can't suddenly surprise us," Gingrich said at a recent town hall meeting in New York sponsored by tea party supporters.

Meanwhile, Romney is running strong in New Hampshire, which holds the nation's first primary on Jan. 10. Romney is also seen by most conservatives at this point as having the greatest chance of defeating President Barack Obama next year.

But Romney continues to be viewed with suspicion by many conservatives who say he has changed his stance on such critical issues as abortion and health care. Santorum acknowledged Sunday that Romney has embraced more conservative positions on issues.

"The question is, you know, what's the sincerity of the move and whether he can be trusted," said Santorum.

Bachmann said it was too soon to declare anyone a true front-runner because the dynamic in the race was constantly changing.

"We've got 30 days," she said. "That's an eternity in this race."

Reince Priebus, the Republican Party chairman, said Sunday that he was indifferent to Cain's departure and that it was "only natural" in the face of falling poll numbers and trouble raising money.

This week's agenda for the primary candidates included a stop in Arizona by Romney and a forum Wednesday by the Republican Jewish Coalition in Washington, which is expected to attract Bachmann, Gingrich, Huntsman, Perry, Romney and Santorum. Gingrich was scheduled to meet Monday with real-estate mogul Donald Trump at Trump's New York offices. Trump, who briefly entered the primary race in the spring and drew considerable publicity when he questioned the validity of Obama's birth certificate, said he would moderate a Republican presidential debate in Iowa on Dec. 27.

Paul, who has clashed publicly with Trump, said he thought the GOP was making a mistake in giving Trump so much credibility.

"I don't understand the marching to his office. I mean I didn't know that he had an ability to lay on hands, you know, and anoint people," Paul said.

Paul and Bachmann spoke on CNN's "State of the Union." Santorum spoke on ABC's "This Week." Priebus spoke on NBC's "Meet the Press."

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