By Howard Fischer | Capitol Media Services via Arizona Capitol Times
Immigrant rights groups are giving up their bid to void the “papers, please” provision of Arizona’s controversial SB1070 in exchange for some state-issued informal — and non-binding — guidance on how police should enforce it.
In an agreement being unveiled this afternoon, the organizations are dropping their appeal of a ruling last year by U.S. District Court Judge Susan Bolton that there is nothing inherently illegal about the provision in the 2010 law requiring that police officers, when possible, check the immigration status of people they have stopped for any other reason.
Foes had tried to show the law was racially motivated. But Bolton said while it may be that most of the people affected in Arizona are Hispanic, the law itself is racially neutral.
