N.C. Senate One Vote Away From Passing Anti-Immigrant Bill

RALEIGH – Today the North Carolina Senate voted to approve HB 100, a bill that creates new rules for the enforcement of state immigration laws. Senator Mike Woodard objected to the bill on its third reading, meaning that the Senate must vote one more time before the bill is sent to the House.

Specifically, the bill would

• Take away the ability of law enforcement officers to use local or organizations IDs, such as those used in Greensboro, as a tool for for identifying crime victims, witnesses, and suspects
• Empower the Attorney General’s office to determine if a local government is in violation of state immigration laws and potentially cut off funding to school construction and other infrastructure projects if a jurisdiction is found in violation
• Allow anonymous tipsters to claim that a local government is violating immigration laws, compelling the Attorney General’s office to dedicate resources to an investigation.

Immigrant rights organizations, including the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) of North Carolina, are opposed to the bill.

“This bill creates a costly, burdensome and unnecessary framework for enforcing immigration laws that would make it harder for law enforcement officers to do their jobs, encourage fraudulent tipsters to waste government resources, and give the Attorney General sweeping powers to withhold funding from school construction and other infrastructure projects,” said Sarah Preston, Policy Director of the ACLU of North Carolina. “These changes would allow massive government overreach and waste precious taxpayer dollars – all in an attempt to target and single out undocumented North Carolinians who work, go to school, and contribute to our communities in countless ways.”

Read a factsheet on HB100 by the ACLU of North Carolina and the North Carolina Justice Center here:

http://www.acluofnc.org/files/legislative/HB_100_factsheet.pdf