Status Quo for Arizona

From Evelyn Cruz, Associate Clinical Professor at Arizona State University:

Well, Arizona remains as it has been, if not worse as backlash against the Latino community may go up (see newspaper quotes below). Both Sheriff Arpaio and County Attorney Thomas were re-elected. They ran on an anti-immigrant (“illegals are criminals”) campaign. The bright side was that Arpaio was not able to win by a landslide (he still got 56% of the vote so it wasn’t so close).

“The sheriff took Tuesday’s results as a vote of confidence in his office’s policies and swore nothing would change in the next four years. “In fact, I might even do it more,” Arpaio said of his immigration-enforcement policies, which have drawn criticism from across the country”.

“He [Thomas] added that he has new ideas to combat illegal immigration and plans to lobby for more legislation, including a “trespassing” law to make it a state crime to illegally immigrate to Arizona. He also plans a law prohibiting day laborers from gathering at known pickup areas.”

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