California Legislature

Sacramento Ca - The California Latino Legislative Caucus presented a resolution on Immigrant Day in California in response to the Arizona Law SB 1070, permitting state and local law enforcement officials to engage in racial profiling, thereby turning the clock back on a generation of civil rights gains.

As Chair of the Latino Caucus, Senator Gilbert Cedillo (D-Los Angeles) issued the resolution against SB1070, which declares that the law specifically turns unlawful presence, which is a federal civil administrative offense under immigration law, into a state crime; requires state and local law enforcement to question people who they “reasonably suspect” of being in the country unlawfully and grants police the power to arrest individuals without a warrant if they believe such individuals are here unlawfully in violation of federal civil immigration laws.

The Latino Caucus resolution denounces this new law because it undermines fundamental civil rights and civil liberties, and poses a special threat to people of color who live and travel through Arizona. Although the modified law prohibits racial profiling, public officials are asserting that undocumented immigrants can be identified by the clothes they wear and the way they speak, and are using stereotypes as proxies for race which will inevitably lead to racial profiling.

The resolution declares that the State of California prohibits the unequal treatment of its residents and, furthermore, prohibits racial profiling of any kind. The Latino Caucus condemns the Arizona state laws based on SB 1070 and HB 2162 and urges the State of Arizona to repeal both. We need a humane and workable solution, not an irrational and irresponsible response to our broken immigration system, and we need solutions that help our state and our country move forward together rather than divide us.

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