Opinion: Arizona governor’s immigration stunt isn’t fooling anyone
Official Arizona Governor Photograph
Skirmishing between state and federal governments over immigration has continued unabated in 2022.
Raul A. Reyes for CNN writes that outgoing Arizona Governor “Doug Ducey is leaving a monument, of sorts, behind. Ducey’s administration has been placing enormous empty shipping containers along an eastern stretch of the Grand Canyon State’s border with Mexico. Topped with razor wire, this makeshift barrier is supposed to help stop illegal immigration.”
“Arizona is going to do the job that Joe Biden refuses to do – secure the border in any way we can,” Ducey said in October. “We’re not backing down.”
Reyes says that “not only is Ducey’s project likely illegal, it is also expensive, ineffective and dangerous. Instead of cooperating with the federal government or Arizona’s Gov.-elect Katie Hobbs, Ducey is staging a massive border stunt which will not address any of our immigration issues.”
Fox News, the Associated Press, and other news outlet report on the Biden administration’s filing yesterday of a lawsuit against the state of Arizona over its construction of a makeshift border wall, alleging that the state is trespassing on federal lands. The suit, was filed in federal district court in Arizona.
The complaint alleges that the installation of shipping containers topped with razor wire, “damage[s] federal lands, threaten[s] public safety, and impede[s] the ability of federal agencies and officials . . . to perform their official duties.”
KJ