Today the Supreme Court will hear arguments in Arizona v. United States, the case that will decide the constitutionality of Arizona’s controversial immigration law, SB 1070. Arizona Governor Jan Brewer signed SB 1070 into law in April 2010, and the Supreme Court agreed to hear the case in last December. Arizona argues that the federal government is not doing enough to prevent illegal immigration, and that states must therefore take matters into their own hands.
The Obama Administration believes that laws like SB 1070 preempt federal immigration laws, and that only the federal government can make immigration policy. Kris Kobach is the Secretary of State of Kansas and the architect of SB 1070, as well as immigration laws in Alabama, Utah, South Carolina and a number of other states. He argues that the immigration law signed into law by President Bill Clinton in 1996 allowed for state and local cooperation in immigration enforcement. The Obama Administration, Secretary Kobach believes, “has a tough job in this case because they’re basically saying, ‘well that may be what the law says, but our policy in the Obama Administration is different.'” Secretary Kobach is also an informal adviser to Mitt Romney Presidential Campaign. He insists that Romney is not “pivoting” on immigration as he enters the general election. “He was speaking to more than conservative Republicans [during the primary],” Secretary Kobach says. “He said on national television, in multiple debates, that he favors a policy encouraging aliens to self-deport.”