William_T._Bianco,_David_T._Canon]_American_Polit

192192 Chapter 5 | Civil Rights

Following the September 11 terrorist attacks, some people saw immigration as a

threat that must be curtailed. The government made it clear that it would not engage in

racial profiling of Arab Americans—for example, subjecting them to stricter screening

at airports—but many commentators argued that such profiling would be justified, and

there was at least anecdotal evidence of an increase in discrimination against people

of Middle Eastern descent. After the terrorist attacks in Paris and San Bernardino,

California, in 2016 the debate in the presidential campaign shifted to a strongly anti-

immigrant tone. Donald Trump proposed preventing all Muslims from entering the

United States until the government could make sure they did not pose a terrorist threat.

He quickly followed through on that pledge, but his original travel ban and a subsequent

version that did not narrowly target Muslim countries were also struck down. Federal

judges cited Trump’s campaign promise as evidence of the ban’s true intent. However,

in 2018 the Supreme Court upheld the third version of the travel ban, saying that

the president’s power over immigration policy was not undermined by his political

comments about the possible intent of the travel ban.^112

Over the past two decades, immigration has been central in many political

debates. The intensity of that debate increased in 2010 when Arizona enacted an

anti-immigration law that requires local law-enforcement officials to check the

immigration status of a person in a “lawful stop, detention, or arrest” if there is

a “reasonable suspicion” that the person is an illegal alien. The law also requires

immigrants to always carry papers verifying their immigration status and bans people

without proper documents from seeking work in public places. Many civil rights

violations occurred when local law-enforcement officials started enforcing this law.

States with similar laws include South Carolina, Alabama, Utah, Georgia, and Indiana.

Arizona governor Jan Brewer said, “Decades of federal inaction and misguided policy

have created a dangerous and unacceptable situation, and states deserve clarity from

the Court in terms of what role they have in fighting illegal immigration.”^113 Opponents

of the law argue that it requires illegal racial profiling and that the federal government

has the sole responsibility for deciding immigration law.

The Supreme Court struck down three of the four main provisions of the law, citing

the supremacy clause of the Constitution. This decision meant that Congress, not the

states, determines immigration law when the two laws conflict. The Court upheld

the controversial “show me your papers” part of the law, saying that the state was

simply enforcing the federal law. However, the Court indicated that the law must be

applied in a race-neutral way and could be struck down if there was clear evidence of

racial profiling.^114 Several months later, a federal district court judge cleared the way

for implementation of the “show me your papers” law, saying that the Supreme Court

When President Trump announced

his original travel ban preventing

individuals from select Muslim-

majority countries from entering the

United States, people flooded airports

across the country in protest.

Full_06_APT_64431_ch05_148-197.indd 192 16/11/18 1:31 PM