July, 20 2010, 03:11pm EDT
ACLU And Other Groups In Court Thursday At 10:00 a.m. PDT To Block Implementation Of Arizona's Racial Profiling Law
U.S. Department Of Justice Argument To Follow On The Same Day
PHOENIX
On Thursday, July 22 at 10 a.m. PDT, the
American Civil Liberties Union and a coalition of civil rights
organizations will argue in a federal court in Phoenix that Arizona's
racial profiling law, known as SB 1070, should be blocked while their
lawsuit against the unconstitutional measure is being litigated.
Immediately after the hearing, the coalition will be available for
questions from the press. The U.S. Department of Justice will also ask
the court to block SB 1070 in a hearing at 1:30 p.m. PST on the same
day.
The civil rights coalition filed its
lawsuit challenging the extreme law on May 17, charging that it invites
racial profiling, interferes with federal law and violates various
constitutional guarantees including the First Amendment, equal
protection and the right to travel.
The coalition includes the ACLU,
MALDEF, National Immigration Law Center (NILC), Asian Pacific American
Legal Center (APALC) - a member of the Asian American Center for
Advancing Justice - ACLU of Arizona, National Day Laborer Organizing
Network (NDLON) and the National Association for the Advancement of
Colored People (NAACP). The law firms of Munger, Tolles & Olson LLP
and Altshuler Berzon LLP are acting as co-counsel in the case.
WHAT:
Court hearing on Friendly House, et al. v. Whiting, et. al and
press availability with lawyers from the civil rights coalition. Some
clients represented by the coalition will also be available for
interviews.
WHO:
Omar
Jadwat, staff attorney, ACLU Immigrants' Rights Project and Nina Perales, Southwestern Regional
Counsel, MALDEF will present arguments at the hearing. Karen Tumlin, Managing Attorney, NILC;
Lucas Guttentag, Director, ACLU
Immigrants' Rights Project; Julie Su,
Litigation Director, APALC; Chris
Newman, Legal Director, NDLON; and co-counsel from ACLU of
Arizona and Munger Tolles as well as plaintiffs from Friendly House, et al. v. Whiting, et al.
will also be available for press questions.
WHEN:
Hearing on July 22 at 10 a.m. PDT
Outdoor press conference and press
availability outside courtroom to follow immediately after hearing
WHERE:
Courtroom 200 (Special Procedures
Courtroom)
Sandra Day O'Connor U.S. Courthouse
401 W. Washington Street
Phoenix, Arizona
The motion for a preliminary
injunction can be found at: www.aclu.org/immigrants-rights-racial-justice/friendly-house-et-al-v-whiting-et-al-plaintiffs-motion-preliminary-
The American Civil Liberties Union was founded in 1920 and is our nation's guardian of liberty. The ACLU works in the courts, legislatures and communities to defend and preserve the individual rights and liberties guaranteed to all people in this country by the Constitution and laws of the United States.
(212) 549-2666LATEST NEWS
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"As Donald Trump prepares to return to the Oval Office, it is more important than ever to take the power to start a nuclear war out of the hands of a single individual and ensure that Congress's constitutional role is respected and fulfilled," wrote Sen. Edward Markey and Rep. Ted Lieu.
Dec 12, 2024
Two Democratic lawmakers sent a letter to outgoing U.S. President Joe Biden Thursday, urging him to place more checks on potential nuclear weapons use by mandating that a president must obtain authorization from Congress before initiating a nuclear first strike.
The letter writers, Sen. Edward Markey (D-Mass.) and Rep. Ted Lieu (D-Calif.), argue that "such a policy would provide clear directives for the military to follow: A president could order a nuclear launch only if (1) Congress had approved the decision, providing a constitutional check on executive power or (2) the United States had already been attacked with a nuclear weapon. This would be infinitely safer than our current doctrine."
The two write that time is of the essence: "As Donald Trump prepares to return to the Oval Office, it is more important than ever to take the power to start a nuclear war out of the hands of a single individual and ensure that Congress's constitutional role is respected and fulfilled."
The Constitution vests Congress, not the president, with the power to declare war (though presidents have used military force without getting the OK from Congress on multiple occasions in modern history, according to the National Constitution Center).
During the Cold War, when nuclear weapons policy was produced, speed was seen as essential to deterrence, according to Jon Wolfsthal, the director of global risk at the Federation of American Scientists, who wrote an op-ed for The Washington Post last year that makes a similar argument to Markey and Lieu.
"There is no reason today to rely on speedy decision-making during situations in which the United States might launch first. Even as relations with Moscow are at historic lows, we are worlds removed from the Cold War's dominant knife's-edge logic," he wrote.
While nuclear tensions today may not be quite as high as they were during the apex of the Cold War, fears of nuclear confrontation have been heightened due to poor relations between the United States and Russia over the ongoing war in Ukraine, among other issues. Last month, Russian President Vladimir Putin signed a decree lowering the threshold for potential nuclear weapons use not long after the U.S. greenlit Ukraine's use of U.S.-supplied long range weapons in its fight against Russia.
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On October 16, Israel bombed the Nabatieh municipal complex, killing Mayor Ahmad Khalil and 10 other people.
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As the report notes:
A fragment of the munition found at the site of the attack was analyzed by an Amnesty International weapons expert and based upon its size, shape, and the scalloped edges of the heavy metal casing, identified as most likely a MK-80 series aerial bomb, which would mean it was at least a 500-pound bomb. The United States is the primary supplier of these types of munitions to Israel.
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Citing recent research by the American Immigration Council and the Peterson Institute for International Economics, the JEC report warns that depending on how many immigrants are forced out of the country, Trump's deportations could:
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Highlighting how mass deportations would harm not only undocumented immigrants but also U.S. citizens, the report explains that construction worker losses would "make housing even harder to build, raising its cost," and "reduce the supply of farmworkers who keep Americans fed as well as the supply of home health aides at a time when more Americans are aging and requiring assistance."
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Sen. Martin Heinrich (D-N.M.), who chairs the JEC, said Thursday that "as a son of an immigrant, I know how hard immigrants work, how much they believe in this country, and how much they're willing to give back. They are the backbone of our economy and the driving force behind our nation's growth and prosperity."
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Along with laying out the economic toll of Trump's promised deportations, the JEC report makes the case that "providing a pathway to citizenship is good economics. Immigrants are helping meet labor demand while also demonstrating that more legal pathways to working in the United States are needed to meet this demand."
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The JEC report followed a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing on Tuesday that explored how mass deportations would not only devastate the U.S. economy but also harm the armed forces and tear apart American families.
In a statement, Vanessa Cárdenas, executive director of the advocacy group America's Voice, thanked Senate Judiciary Committee Chair Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) "for calling this important discussion together and shining a spotlight on the potential damage."
Cárdenas pointed out that her group has spent months warning about how Trump's plan would "cripple communities and spike inflation," plus cause "tremendous human suffering as American citizens are ripped from their families, as parents are separated from their children, or as American citizens are deported by their own government."
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