Indiana AG puts immigration policy on hold until AZ rulings

Indiana Public Media
December 24, 2011

Indiana‘s Attorney General wants a time out on a pair of lawsuits challenging the state‘s immigration law. Greg Zoeller asked Thursday that both cases be put on hold until the US Supreme Court rules on a similar case from Arizona.

“Indiana will await guidance,” he says, from the United States Supreme Court on what states are empowered to do when the congress and federal government agencies totally fail in their responsibility to enact and enforce federal immigration policy.”

Zoeller‘s action came less than two days after a lawsuit was filed by a non-profit group in East Chicago that helps Latino residents. A federal judge had already blocked two portions of Indiana’s law after another lawsuit was filed back in May.

The group ‘Union Benefica Mexicana’ is challenging two other parts of the law that were left intact. One section penalizes employers who knowingly hire illegal immigrants. The other section says people applying for day labor jobs must fill out employment authorization forms, and it lets police officers arrest anyone they believe did not fill out those forms.

The law took effect July 1st, but without provisions blocked by US district Judge Sarah Evans-Barker after a federal lawsuit was filed with backing from the A.C.L.U. and the National Immigration Law Center.

One of those provisions would have allowed state and local police to arrest anyone ordered deported by an immigration court.

This article was posted: Saturday, December 24, 2011 at 8:11 am

---

---

---

---