City defends strict immigration laws
SCRANTON, Pa. – The United States’ first trial debating the rights of local governments to curtail illegal immigration began Monday in federal court, with officials from the city of Hazleton defending laws that would make life difficult for undocumented residents there, and civil liberties attorneys charging that the measures unfairly targeted Hispanics.
Attorneys defending the Hazleton ordinances argued that the city wanted to take control of immigration law in their city because the federal government has failed to deal with problems caused by undocumented residents.
They said illegal immigrants brought crime and gangs to the community, drained funding for public schools and caused longer waiting periods in hospital emergency rooms.
Attorneys for the American Civil Liberties Union and other civil rights groups that filed the lawsuit against Hazleton claimed the city’s laws discriminated against Hispanic residents, who have been targeted whether they are legal or illegal. The ordinances conflict with the federal government’s authority to regulate immigration, attorneys argued.
Politicians and immigration organizations say the outcome of the Hazleton trial could have an impact on dozens of U.S. communities that are trying to enact similar illegal immigration laws.
“We’re no longer fighting for only Hazleton,” said mayor Louis J. Barletta, who has fiercely defended the ordinances. Standing outside of the courtroom on Monday, he said, “We’re fighting for cities across the country.”
The city council of the 31,000-resident former coal-mining town northwest of Philadelphia approved ordinances last year that would fine landlords who rent to illegal immigrants, deny business permits to companies that employ them and require residents to register with the city to prove their citizenship.
Hazleton’s Illegal Immigration Relief Act was set to take effect on Nov. 1, 2006, but Federal Judge James Munley barred enforcement until a trial could take place to determine its constitutionality.
During Monday’s opening arguments before Munley, Kris Kobach, lead attorney for Hazleton, said Barletta backed the measures because he wanted to protect the city he served and loved, since the federal government was not doing its job in keeping illegal immigrants out. Kobach, a professor at the University of Missouri School of Law and a one-time immigration adviser to former Attorney General John Ashcroft, said Hazleton’s crime rate jumped with the influx of undocumented residents.
Its population increased by about 10,000 residents in five years, most of whom were Hispanic, although no one can track how many were undocumented. Hazleton was transformed from a peaceful place to a city coping with illegal residents, some of them members of street gangs, according to supporters of the city ordinances.
Illegal immigrants accounted for 30 percent of the city’s drug arrests between 2005 and 2006, according to Kobach. Hazleton police arrested 19 undocumented residents in 2006 for crimes including murder, rape, assault and drug dealing, he said, compared with 3 arrests of illegal immigrants on such charges between 2000 and 2004.
The new residents also drained Hazleton’s public school and health systems, Kobach said. Spending on English as a second language programs soared from $500 in 2000 to $1.1 million in 2006, he said. In the meantime, the average wait time in emergency rooms climbed to more than five hours.
In opening arguments for the plaintiffs, Witold Walczak, lead attorney for the ACLU of Pennsylvania, called the Hazleton situation “Two Tales of a City,” with the mayor and elected officials on one side and Hispanic residents on the other.
After Hazleton’s laws passed, Hispanic residents – legal and illegal – “no longer felt safe in Hazleton,” he said, “Their businesses failed and they started moving out.”
Puerto Rican-born Agapito Lopez, a Hazleton resident and community organizer, testified that he received hate mail after the city ordinances passed. The town that once embraced its Hispanic residents, he said, became divided and unfriendly. He said legal immigrants who contributed to Hazleton’s economy suffered.
Jose Luis Lechuga, 44, a legal resident who came to the U.S. from Mexico, testified that he moved to Hazleton in 1991. In 2000, he opened Lechuga’s Mexican Products, a grocery store that sold such products as tortillas, cheese, chorizo and chiles. As more Hispanics came to town, he added merchandise. He admitted that his business fluctuated, but he said that after the illegal immigrant ordinances passed in 2006, it became impossible to operate. Lechuga closed the store in February.
“I began to see a decrease,” Lechuga said through a court translator. “My people commented and told me they did not want to come in to Hazleton because they didn’t feel safe and they didn’t want to have problems.”