By Michael Fanning

ROAR SC

Complaint cites conflict with federal enforcement of immigration laws

WASHINGTON – The Department of Justice challenged South Carolina’s recently passed immigration law, Act No. 69, in federal court today.

In a complaint, filed in the District of South Carolina, the department states that certain provisions of Act No. 69, as enacted by the state on June 27, 2011, are unconstitutional and interfere with the federal government’s authority to set and enforce immigration policy, explaining that “the Constitution and federal law do not permit the development of a patchwork of state and local immigration policies throughout the country.” South Carolina’s law clearly conflicts with the policies and priorities adopted by the federal government and therefore cannot stand.

South Carolina’s law is designed to further criminalize unauthorized immigrants and, like the Arizona and Alabama laws, expands the opportunity for police to push unauthorized immigrants towards incarceration for various new immigration crimes by enforcing an immigration status verification system. Similar to Arizona’s S.B. 1070 and Alabama’s H.B. 56, this law will place significant burdens on federal agencies, diverting their resources away from high-priority targets, such as terrorism, drug smuggling and gang activity, and those with criminal records. In addition, the law’s mandates on law enforcement will also result in the harassment and detention of foreign visitors and legal immigrants, as well as U.S. citizens, who cannot readily prove their lawful status.

“Today’s lawsuit makes clear once again that the Justice Department will not hesitate to challenge a state’s immigration law, as we have in Arizona, Alabama and South Carolina, if we find that the law interferes with the federal government’s enforcement of immigration,” said Attorney General Eric Holder. “It is understandable that communities remain frustrated with the broken immigration system, but a patchwork of state laws is not the solution and will only create problems. We will continue to monitor the impact these laws might have on our communities and will evaluate each law to determine whether it conflicts with the federal government’s enforcement responsibilities.”

“DHS continues to enforce federal immigration laws in South Carolina in smart, effective ways that focus our resources on criminal aliens, recent border crossers, repeat and egregious immigration law violators and employers who knowingly hire illegal labor,” said Department of Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano. “This kind of legislation diverts critical law enforcement resources from the most serious threats to public safety and undermines the vital trust between local jurisdictions and the communities they serve, while failing to address the underlying problem: the need for comprehensive immigration reform at the federal level.”

The department filed the lawsuit after consultation with the South Carolina attorney general and South Carolina law enforcement officials. The suit was filed on behalf of the Departments of Justice, Homeland Security and State, which share responsibilities in administering federal immigration law. The department will soon request a preliminary injunction to enjoin enforcement of the law, parts of which go into effect on Jan. 1, 2012, arguing that the law’s operation will cause irreparable harm.

The Justice Department previously challenged S.B. 1070 and H.B. 56 on federal preemption grounds. The department continues to review immigration-related laws that were passed in Utah, Indiana and Georgia. Courts have enjoined key parts of the Arizona, Alabama, Georgia and Indiana state laws and temporarily restrained enforcement of Utah’s law.

The SC Progressive Network will hold its 16th annual fall strategy summit Oct. 29 at Brookland Baptist Fellowship Hall, 1066 Sunset Blvd., West Columbia. Grassroots activists from across the state will gather to co-ordinate plans for the coming legislative session and beyond.

“We have been building a statewide progressive movement for 16 years,” said Network Director Brett Bursey. “We are now faced with historic opportunities due to Wall Street greed, anti-government politicians, and a state budget robbed by special interests.”

Most recently, the Network has been leading a grassroots fight against special-interest tax breaks that keep billions out of the state budget.

It also has been working hard to educate and mobilize communities statewide in an effort to block South Carolina’s new voter ID law.

“The unnecessary and costly requirement for voters to have a state-issued photo ID is a partisan attempt to suppress the vote,” said Network Co-Chair Rep. Joe Neal. “It is no coincidence that minorities, seniors, students, rural and low-income voters will be most affected, as they historically vote Democratic. We will continue our work to have this law blocked.”

In its Oct. 26 response to the US Dept. of Justice, the State Election Commission deleted voters who have been dropped from the list of voters without photo IDs due to a criminal conviction.

“There are tens of thousands of voters who have completed a criminal sentence, who are eligible to vote, who won’t be notified of the new law,” said Rep. Neal. “There are over a quarter-million registered voters without DMV IDs, and there is no doubt that many of them will be disenfranchised.”

Network Co-Chair Donna Dewitt is also the President of the SC AFL-CIO, a statewide federation representing over 80,000 current and former union members. “The governor has declared outright war on workers rights, and is making the ridiculous argument that our economy can be improved by suppressing wages,” Dewitt said. “We’ve got to connect the dots between the anti-worker, anti-immigrant, anti-minority laws being passed and expose them as the corporate power grab that they are.”

The summit begins with a 10am meeting of organizations and individual activists for Network housekeeping. The meeting is open to anyone interested in knowing more about the Network and its coalition members.

At 1:30, the public is invited to take part in an engaging presentation by Dr. Mike Fanning of the tax reform group ROAR SC, who will argue that the state’s not broke; the system is. His show is part comedy and 100 percent shocking truth. Dr. Fanning will field questions from the audience. Later, we’ll move the discussion to tactics and strategy to move this issue in the coming months.

“If you are concerned about the economy and the corporate-sponsored assault on democracy, you don’t want to miss this event,” Bursey said. “These are the hard times we have been preparing for.”

You don’t need to be a Network member to attend. Nor do you need to stay the whole day. Come when you can; leave when you must.

Registration is $10, which includes a Mexican buffet at 12:30 catered by Tio’s. The public session beginning at 1:30 is free. RSVP required for lunch at 803-808-3384 or network@scpronet.com.

By JIM DAVENPORT
Associated Press

COLUMBIA, S.C. (AP) — South Carolina’s new voter photo identification law appears to be disproportionately affecting minority voters in one of the state’s largest counties and black precincts elsewhere, according to an analysis by The Associated Press.
For instance, nearly half the voters who cast ballots at a historically black college in Columbia lack state-issued photo identification and could face problems voting in next year’s presidential election, according to the analysis of precinct-level data provided by the state Election Commission.

In surrounding Richland County, the state’s second-most populous county, the percentage of minority voters without the IDs is also higher than what it is statewide. The same is true for majority-black Orangeburg County.

“This is electoral genocide,” state Democratic Party Chairman Dick Harpootlian said. “This is disenfranchising huge groups of people who don’t have the money to go get an ID card.”

State Election Commission spokesman Chris Whitmire said the numbers show there is work ahead for the state.
“It means they would have to take some action to get proper ID,” Whitmire said.

South Carolina’s photo identification law requires people to show a state-issued driver’s license or identification card, a military ID or passport when they vote. Without those forms of identification, they can still cast a provisional ballot or vote absentee. The U.S. Justice Department has been reviewing the law for months under the federal Voting Rights Act.

South Carolina is among the five states that passed laws this year requiring some form of ID at the polls, while such laws were already on the books in Indiana and Georgia.

Proponents of the laws say they will prevent fraud, although even they are hard-pressed to come up with large numbers of cases around the country in which someone tried to vote under a false identity. Opponents say the laws are a way to effectively keep minorities, traditionally Democratic voters, away from the polls. They argue that blacks, Hispanics, senior citizens, people with disabilities and the poor are more likely to lack the required photo ID.

In South Carolina, previously-reported statewide numbers suggested that, overall, the law’s effect on white and nonwhite voters would conform to the state’s voting demographics: 70 percent of the state’s 2.7 million registered voters are white and 30 percent are nonwhite. Meanwhile, 66 percent of the 216,596 active, registered voters without state-issued photo IDs are white and 34 percent nonwhite.

But the numbers can skew differently at the local level. Lacking state-issued IDs are 11,087 nonwhite voters in Richland County and 4,544 in Orangeburg County. That means half the voters affected by the law in Richland County aren’t white, and in Orangeburg County it’s 73 percent.

A statewide look at the 2,134 individual precincts also indicates that black precincts are some of the hardest-hit. The analysis shows there are 10 precincts where nearly all of those affected are minorities, a total of 1,977 voters.

The same holds true for white voters in a number of precincts, but the overall effect is much more spread out and involves fewer total voters: There are 44 precincts where only white voters are affected, or 1,831 people in all.

The precinct that votes at Benedict College in Columbia, has 2,790 voters, including nine white voters. In that precinct, 1,343 of the precinct’s nonwhite voters lack state identification, but only five white voters do.

Karen Rutherford has run voter registration efforts at the private, historically black college across town from the Statehouse and a couple of blocks from the county’s voter office for years. She said students had a tough time in the 2008 election as their IDs were challenged at the precinct. “They were upset because someone was trying to take away their ability to vote.”

A precinct at state-run South Carolina State University has 2,305 active voters, including 33 white voters. There, 800 nonwhite voters and 17 white voters there lack state IDs.

The new law doesn’t bar voting for people without photo identification, but it can create hurdles. They’ll still be able to vote absentee by mail, go to voter offices and get new voter registration cards with pictures or cast provisional ballots that require them to later produce the ID.

The state is offering free ID cards. To get those, people have to show documents that include their name, such as birth certificates, marriage or divorce records.

Republican Gov. Nikki Haley supports the law and offered voters without IDs free rides to state offices to get them last month.
The law requires the state to develop a list of names of people who lack state-issued identification. And the Justice Department has asked the state to document how it will reach out to those voters. South Carolina’s election law changes have to be cleared by federal authorities because of past voting rights abuses.