What kinds of suits do you envision being filed? What would trigger them, and do you think such suits would actually succeed?
Well there are going to be two types of suits filed
1. Suits against this bill. These are already being filed by everyone from the ACLU to Arizona police officers. Officer Martin Escobar filed his lawsuit in part because,
"in [Escobar's] experience as a Law Enforcement Officer, skin color and/or physical features does not provide any race neutral criteria or basis to suspect or identify who is lawfully in the United States." Thus, the provision of the bill requiring police to request identification from anybody they happen to come across who they have "reasonable suspicion" to believe is illegally in the country is nonsensical; it simply pushes law enforcement to use racial profiling as the only means they can think of to guess at undocumented status of any given person.
Further more other AZ law enforcement further dislike the law
In Sahuarita, Arizona, Chief John Harris, the president of the Arizona Association of Chiefs of Police, opposes SB 1070 according to an article in Time magazine. He fears that the provisions in the new law will drain resources, create budgetary problems, and open up vulnerability for costly lawsuits. Not only can those targeted by law enforcement sue for infringements on their constitutional rights, SB 1070 gives everyday nativist Arizonans the ability to sue their local police department if they feel they aren't hunting down enough undocumented immigrants. Chief Harris also worries that the legislation will provoke mass fear amongst the Hispanic community, making them less likely to report crime.
Both quotes from
http://immigration.change.org/blog/view/police_join_fight_against_arizona_sb_1070
You will also have legal U.S. citizens suing for the infringement of their rights if they are unlawfully detained due to this bill. I can tell you I don't carry anything on me that could prove my citizenship. Now these could go one of two ways. First they could succeed and further bankrupt my state. Second they could fail and set a standard that allows AZ law enforcement the right to illegally detain U.S. citizens. I don't like either out come.
2. The second type will be citizens suing counties, cities, police forces, and even the state for not enforcing these laws. As most law enforcement does not believe they have the resources to enforce this law these lawsuits are pretty much guaranteed to win.
How big a burden do you expect this to be?
BIG. I can't even begin to think of a number but any amount is to much. In case you are not aware Arizona isn't doing so well these days when it comes to budgets. Arizona ranks either dead last or close to it when it comes to education and any amount wasted on these lawsuits should be spent on improving our state not paying lawyers.
No, it would not. That falls clearly under profiling, which the law specifically prohibits.
So the bill requires that police enforce all federal immigration laws including verifying the status of a resident alien yet the main give away of a resident alien is a foreign accent and you can't use that as a reason to ask for papers? How do you enforce this law?
I will repeat this point. Forget the lawsuits, forget reasonable suspicion, forget the damage this will do to community relations, forget that law enforcement doesn't have the resources to enforce this law and focus on one thing...
This law will not effect the illegal immigration problems of the U.S. in any positive way. It is meant to make us look tough but in reality it will make us look like fools.
