Targeting illegal immigrants, Arizona goes too far

IN ARIZONA, where the official malice directed at immigrants who came to the United States illegally is unsurpassed, Republican lawmakers are pushing a bill that would criminalize every such immigrant just for being in the state. It's the latest attempt to harass, intimidate and hound the state's several hundred thousand undocumented residents. Until now, only police departments that have entered into deals with the federal government have been empowered to arrest people on suspicion that they lack proper documentation. The bill, which is expected to clear the legislature in the near future, would broaden that authority and allow such arrests statewide by expanding the definition of trespassing to include the immigrants' mere presence in the state. Read the full story

False immigration raid rumor has Latino community anxious

A local Latino civil rights organization is dismissing rumors spreading through the immigrant community of arrests at a Trenton supermarket and at Walmart stores as a "cruel, inhumane hoax." There is no evidence that an immigration raid took place Saturday in the parking lot of the Food Bazaar in South Trenton's Roebling Shopping Center, as many in the Hispanic immigrant community believe, according to the Latin American Legal Defense and Education Fund in Princeton. Read the full story