'Conservative Landscape' Against Illegal Immigration, But ACLU, SPLC Not Liberal?

There was some labeling slant in Atlanta bureau chief Kim Severson's take on a crackdown on illegal immigrants in Southern states in Saturday's "Southern Lawmakers Focus on Illegal Immigrants [1]."

Some of the toughest bills in the nation aimed at illegal immigrants are making their way through legislatures in the South.

Proposed legislation in Alabama, Georgia and South Carolina, where Republicans control the legislatures and the governors' mansions, have moved further than similar proposals in many other states, where concerns about the legality and financial impact of aggressive immigration legislation have stopped lawmakers.

Dozens of immigration-related bills showed up early in legislative sessions across the South. Some were aimed at keeping illegal immigrants from college or from marrying American citizens. Most died quickly, but three proposals designed to give police broader powers to identify and report illegal immigrants are moving forward.

The conservative political landscape, and a relatively recent and large addition of Latinos, both new immigrants and legal residents from other states, have contributed to the batch of legislation, say supporters and opponents of the proposed laws.

The story's text box made the same "conservative" case: "A conservative drift in state capitols coincides with an influx of Latinos."

Yet while opponents of illegal immigration were accurately tagged as "conservative," Severson failed to slap an ideological label on several liberal groups featured in her story, like the Immigration Policy Center [2], the ACLU, and the Southern Poverty Law Center.