Secretary of State Hillary Clinton announced the Obama administration's plan to file suit against Arizona's new immigration enforcement law in an interview with a television station in Ecuador over a week ago. It was certainly a peculiar place and person to employ when announcing a domestic initiative by the Justice Department, and the story only came to light when a conservative blog posted the interview.
Saturday's story by Randal Archibold and Mark Landler, "Justice Dept. Will Fight Arizona on Immigration," repeated Archibold's usual labeling bias [1] over the simmering Arizona immigration issue, pitting "conservative groups" and "the right" versus non-ideological "civil rights groups" who are unnamed but would certainly include left-leaning groups.
With immigration continuing to be a hot issue in political campaigns across the country, the Arizona law, which grants the local police greater authority to check the legal status of people they stop, has become a rallying cry for the Tea Party and other conservative groups.
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At least five lawsuits have already been filed in federal court, and civil rights groups have asked a federal judge to issue an injunction while the cases are heard.
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Still, in focusing on Arizona, the Obama administration is making a politically risky calculation: the move could help repair America's image south of the border but open the administration to charges that it is trampling state's rights. And a legal battle could energize the right during an election year.
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