Latest news with #WarrenPetersen
Yahoo
22-04-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
GOP threatens 2026 ballot measure after Hobbs vetoes Arizona ICE Act
Senate President Warren Petersen speaks at an April 21, 2025, press conference at the Arizona Capitol. Petersen and other Republicans said Gov. Katie Hobbs was wrong to veto their "Arizona ICE Act" legislation and said they may take it to the ballot in 2026. Photo by Gloria Rebecca Gomez | Arizona Mirror Despite multiple cases of U.S. citizens being wrongfully detained, Republican lawmakers in Arizona want to force law enforcement agencies, city officials and even school leaders to make it easier for ICE to deport people — and they're threatening to go to the ballot to do it. Last week, Gov. Katie Hobbs vetoed a GOP priority bill, known as the Arizona ICE Act, that sought to force state and local cooperation with federal immigration authorities. On Monday, Republican backers of the bill lashed out at the Democratic governor's rejection of that idea, and warned that the legislation might return in 2026. Senate President Warren Petersen, who sponsored the bill, lambasted Hobbs for playing 'political games' and said the bill's backers are considering going to voters next year to circumvent her veto stamp. SUBSCRIBE: GET THE MORNING HEADLINES DELIVERED TO YOUR INBOX Senate Bill 1164 would have mandated that every police department and sheriff's office in the state comply with ICE detainers. Also known as immigration holds, detainers are written requests from ICE to law enforcement agencies to hold a person in custody for an extra 48 hours after their scheduled release time — even if that person hasn't been convicted of any crime — to determine whether they're eligible for deportation. Hobbs vetoes Republican bill that would have brought ICE agents into Arizona schools Under the vetoed legislation, law enforcement agencies that didn't follow its mandates could have faced investigations and lawsuits from the Arizona attorney general. ICE detainers have become a focus of GOP politicians in multiple states, despite the murky legal basis behind them that has led to U.S. citizens being forced to endure prolonged imprisonment. Detainers don't require probable cause and are often erroneously issued. Just last week, a Georgia native spent the night in a Florida jail under an ICE hold, despite his mother showing a judge his birth certificate. The judge said she was powerless to release the man because Florida law requires law enforcement agencies to comply with ICE detainers. And that case isn't an isolated or recent occurrence either: between 2002 and 2017, ICE wrongly identified as many as 2,840 U.S. citizens as being eligible for deportation. The Arizona ICE Act also sought to bar state government, city councils, law enforcement agencies and even school boards from adopting any policies that limit cooperation with federal immigration authorities. It is currently optional for Arizona law enforcement agencies to comply with ICE detainers Some cities and law enforcement agencies in other states have passed ordinances or chosen to refuse to obey ICE detainers, in light of court rulings that determined imprisoning people beyond their scheduled release date is unconstitutional and lawsuits filed after detainers were issued against U.S. citizens.. During an April 21 news conference, Petersen pointed to the success of the Secure Border Act as proof that Arizonans both want the state to take a more active role in enforcing federal immigration laws and would welcome the Arizona ICE Act. 'Arizona's voters spoke loud and clear last November when they overwhelmingly passed the Secure the Border Act,' he said. Neary 63% of Arizona voters cast their ballots last year in favor of Proposition 314, the Secure Border Act. Republicans sent that proposal to the ballot after Hobbs vetoed similar legislation. Along with enacting new penalties for the sale of lethal fentanyl and the use of false documentation to apply for jobs or public benefits, the act made it a state crime for migrants to cross the southern border anywhere but at an official port of entry. Since its passage, Republicans have touted it as a voter mandate and latched onto it as the motivation behind the party's aggressive border policies. Petersen sold the Arizona ICE Act as a bid to support President Donald Trump's mass deportation agenda and he linked immigrants with criminality to justify tightened relationships between local and federal authorities. 'Gang members, child sex traffickers, murderers, rapists, drug dealers, human smugglers and terrorists were allowed to freely walk across our borders into the United States under the Biden administration,' he said. 'President Trump has finally come to put a stop to this madness.' Encounters at the country's southern border reached record highs during the Biden administration, but federal immigration authorities responded by ramping up deportation efforts. Between January 2021 and November 2024, approximately 4.6 million people were expelled from the country. By comparison, Trump oversaw 2.1 million removals during his first term. U.S. Department of Homeland Security officials estimated that the majority of people encountered at the country's southwest border between February 2021 and October 2023 were removed. Yavapai County Sheriff David Rhodes, a Republican who oversees a county that is more than four hours away from the Arizona-Mexico border and who has been a frequent proponent of anti-immigrant legislation, also claimed that the Arizona ICE Act simply seeks to ensure that people who have committed crimes are detained. 'You have very bad people that live in communities that just haven't been caught yet, and they're subject to removal,' he said. Proponents of the Arizona ICE Act have frequently employed xenophobic language to frame immigrants as criminals and call for the legislation's passage. Advocates claim that compliance with ICE detainers will keep such criminals off the street, despite evidence that the vast majority of detainers are actually issued for non-violent offenses. An analysis of detainers issued in the first two months of the Trump administration by the Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse found that 72% of people who were subject to an ICE detainer had no previous criminal record. And out of the 17,972 ICE holds, only 30 were targeted at convicted rapists and just 65 were issued for people who committed murder. Petersen waved off concerns about due process violations because of wrongly issued detainers, saying that he trusts law enforcement agents to do their best. Plus, he said, we should expect the police will make errors, and it's not a big deal when they make mistakes. 'Any time law enforcement is in a situation, there's a potential that they don't enforce the law properly, so that's no different than any other situation,' he said. 'Of course, law enforcement gets it right 99% of the time. Sometimes they don't, and there's consequences to that: litigation and the government ends up settling a lawsuit. But I trust law enforcement to properly enforce the law almost all of the time.' If the Arizona ICE Act ends up on the ballot and voters approve it, taxpayers may have to foot the bill for legal challenges that arise from unconstitutional detainments. The legislation also presents other costs that the GOP-majority legislature has yet to address. Along with requiring local sheriffs offices and police departments to hold onto people in custody for longer than the initial arrest warrants, the Arizona Department of Corrections, Rehabilitation and Reentry would also be required to house people under an ICE hold. A fiscal impact report by legislative budget analysts concluded that, while some of the expenses could be covered by the federal government, new costs for the Department of Corrections, the Department of Public Safety and local law enforcement agencies could still be incurred. Additionally, the state would have to pay for any investigations and lawsuits launched by the state attorney general to enforce the bill's mandates. Before lawmakers send the Arizona ICE Act to the 2026 ballot, they would first need to identify a way to pay for its expected costs. The Arizona Constitution requires ballot measures that are projected to increase government spending to come up with funding that isn't pulled from the state's general operating fund. Whether they will actually do so is an open question. Last year, GOP lawmakers failed to account for that issue when they sent the Secure Border Act to the ballot, and are now facing a lawsuit that could potentially invalidate it. But, according to Petersen, there is no funding shortfall in the Arizona ICE Act. 'There's no costs to honoring a detainer,' he said. In her veto letter, Hobbs said her biggest issue with the Arizona ICE Act was that it gave federal immigration authorities unfettered power over how local officials and law enforcement agencies approach the enforcement of immigration laws, forcing them to comply even if they disagree with the White House's directives. It's bad public policy, she said, to 'tie the hands' of law enforcement officials. 'Arizonans, not Washington, DC politicians, must decide what's best for Arizona,' the Democrat wrote. But Rhodes defended the proposal as necessary to ensure that city council officials don't wade into law enforcement issues. 'We do not need the (local) governments putting wedges or barriers in between information sharing or cooperation between (law enforcement) agencies,' he said. Rhodes, who is serving his second term as sheriff of Arizona's most Republican county, said that the state needs to step in when other sheriffs choose to limit their cooperation with federal immigration authorities. 'The state should be telling those sheriffs: If you have somebody in your custody and that person has committed a crime, particularly a violent crime, and they are subject to removal from this country, they must notify the immigration authorities,' he said. SUPPORT: YOU MAKE OUR WORK POSSIBLE
Yahoo
11-04-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
GOP lawmakers are building school-to-deportation pipelines with the ‘Arizona ICE Act'
U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement's Homeland Security Investigations officers execute criminal search warrants and arrest more than 100 employees on federal immigration violations at a trailer manufacturing business in Sumner in 2018. Photo by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement In the name of public safety, Arizona lawmakers, led by Republican Senate President Warren Petersen, want to force police departments to hold undocumented crime suspects with federal immigration detainers. 'Go back to Africa!' and 'Go back to Mexico!' are phrases that countless Black and Brown adults recall hearing during their childhoods, a reminder that many still see us as criminals and outsiders. These slurs, wielded as weapons, send the clear message that we do not belong in our own country. I've had 'Go Back to Africa' yelled at me repeatedly from childhood through adulthood. The Trump administration has already said it wants to send U.S. prisoners — which means Black Americans, given how Black people disproportionately make up prison populations — to a maximum security prison labor camp in El Salvador, from which they may never return. It's not a stretch to expect that the Trump administration will soon do whatever it can to deport Black Americans to countries they've never been to, merely the latest extension of the targeting by law enforcement of Black and Brown communities — targeting we see in action through School Resource Officers and ICE enforcement in places that should be safe, like schools. Now, Arizona lawmakers are reinforcing the same exclusion with Senate Bill 1164, also known as the Arizona Immigration, Cooperation, and Enforcement Act (Arizona ICE Act). The measure, which would mandate state and local law enforcement work with ICE, targeting individuals under ICE detainers and banning policies that limit immigration enforcement, cleared its final legislative hurdle and now awaits its fate with Gov. Katie Hobbs. SUBSCRIBE: GET THE MORNING HEADLINES DELIVERED TO YOUR INBOX This bill echoes SB1070, the infamous 'Show Me Your Papers' law of 2010, which encouraged racial profiling and gave law enforcement unchecked power to interrogate anyone suspected of being undocumented. Though most of SB1070 was struck down as unconstitutional, its racist legacy persists, justifying the criminalization of immigrants and laying the groundwork for policies like SB1164. The bill poses a serious threat to our children's future, particularly their education. By placing Black, Brown and immigrant students under constant surveillance, it turns schools into spaces of anxiety rather than learning. It will strengthen systems that funnels students into prisons, detention centers and even deportation. GOP bill targets Arizona schools that restrict immigration agents on campus Across the country, aggressive immigration enforcement, such as using school records or false information to track families, have led to an increase in chronic absenteeism among Brown students. The fear of deportation discourages attendance, disrupting education and widening the achievement gap. This increases the risk of students being forced out of school and into the school-to-prison or school-to-deportation pipeline. As students wrestle with physical threats, hate crimes and psychological stress, they find it harder to focus, engage with peers and trust their school environment. This struggle often leads to harsher disciplinary actions that disproportionately impact Black and Brown students. Students' tardiness and absences have gone from being met with a simple warning to in-school suspensions, to full multi-day out-of-school suspensions, reflecting a system that punishes rather than supports. An investigation by The Hechinger Report and the Arizona Center for Investigative Reporting found that: Black students make up 6% of total enrollment and 15% of suspensions. Latino students represent 43% of total enrollment and 68% of suspensions. White students account for 37% of total enrolment and 23% of suspensions. Arizona lawmakers are using SB1164 to double down on the same old playbook: more punishment, more fear. Schools are battlegrounds for Black and Brown students who are already policed by School Resource Officers and maybe soon ICE agents. Arizona continues to tear down students instead of lifting them up. SB1164 would deepen racial inequities, prioritizing punishment over protection and fear over opportunity. It would increase chronic absenteeism, discipline issues and erode trust between families and schools. Rather than nurturing growth, the bill aims to turn schools into environments of fear, especially in minoritized communities, where they resemble prisons and detention centers more than places of learning. Research shows that schools without resource officers have lower rates of exclusionary discipline (like the zero-tolerance policies) and better academic outcomes. By removing ICE enforcement, as Phoenix Union High School District has committed to doing, schools can create safer, more supportive environments where students feel safe and stay engaged. The Arizona ICE Act will instill widespread panic, much like SB1070 did. Fifteen years ago, immigrant families avoided hospitals, grocery stores, and even schools to escape harassment. Aggressive immigration enforcement in schools fuels fear, making both immigrant and non-immigrant students feel unsafe especially following immigration raids. ICE agents and police officers in schools don't serve as protectors. They serve as deterrents — not to violence, but rather to student success and fulfillment. Their presence tells Black and Brown students that they are suspects first and students second. It also reminds immigrant families that stepping into a school could mean losing everything. The Trump administration's executive order dismantling the U.S. Department of Education, including its civil rights enforcement, worsens these fears. By cutting investigations into discrimination against students of color and those with disabilities, it allows such practices to go unregulated. Title I funding, which supports low-income students, is at risk and may be funneled into private K-12 schools, further deepening educational disparities and creating additional obstacles for minoritized students. GOP lawmakers send bill mandating ICE cooperation to Hobbs' likely veto If Arizona lawmakers truly cared about education, they would be investing in resources for students, not pushing racist, punitive policies that rob children of their civil right to learn. Every parent hopes to give their child a better life. But access to a safe, enriching education increasingly seems reserved for those with privilege and resources. For the rest of us, school feels more like preparation for incarceration. Arizona has a history of enacting anti-immigrant laws that target our communities, from SB1070 to SB1164. These laws have repeatedly violated rights, separated families and pushed children out of school. Ultimately, the Arizona ICE ACT won't just impact those directly targeted by it; it will destabilize the foundation of Arizona's education system. By inciting fear and increasing punitive measures, the bill creates a more hostile learning environment for vulnerable students, hindering their academic success and long-term well-being. If enacted, it will deepen divides in education and community cohesion, making it even harder for marginalized students to succeed. Arizona's schools should be bastions of learning and success, not fear. It's now up to Hobbs to decide whether Arizona police will become the stooges of federal immigration agents. SUPPORT: YOU MAKE OUR WORK POSSIBLE
Yahoo
14-02-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Republicans advance Florida-style voting bill to Hobbs' desk, where a veto awaits
Arizona Senate President Warren Petersen, flanked by other supporters of Republicans' so-called Florida-style election bill, tells reporters gathered at the Capitol on Feb. 13, 2025, that the bill will speed up election results. Photo by Caitlin Sievers | Arizona Mirror Republicans in the Arizona Legislature fast-tracked a bill this week to speed up election results by adopting policies used in Florida — and eliminating a way that hundreds of thousands of voters cast their ballots each year in order to ensure ballots are counted faster. The legislation, House Bill 2703, passed through the House of Representatives on Feb. 12 by a vote of 32-27 and it cleared the Senate a day later by a vote of 16-10, with only Republicans voting in favor. The bill, which Senate Republicans called 'wildly popular' in a Thursday press release, is headed for a veto from Democratic Gov. Katie Hobbs. Both Hobbs and Republican proponents of the bill have accused one another this week of refusing to make concessions to the other side. 'Governor Hobbs, if you veto this bill, you will be blamed across the entire nation for slowing up our election results,' Republican Maricopa County Supervisor Debbie Lesko said during a Thursday press conference. SUBSCRIBE: GET THE MORNING HEADLINES DELIVERED TO YOUR INBOX Arizona was the last state in which the presidential election was called by the Associated Press in November, and has typically reported its full results about 13 days after the election over the past two decades. The reporting of those results didn't become a problem until Republicans stopped dominating Arizona's elections and the contests became closer and more difficult for the media to call on election night. 'We should no longer have to wait weeks to determine winners and losers,' Senate President Warren Petersen, R-Gilbert, said in a Thursday statement. 'The madness needs to stop. This bill will improve voter confidence and end the frustration. I'm hopeful the Governor will listen to Arizona voters and do the right thing.' The part of the bill that would speed up election results is also one of the provisions that has received the most criticism from Democrats, including House Minority Leader Oscar De Los Santos, who claimed it would disenfranchise hundreds of thousands of voters. That's because HB2703 would curb drop offs of 'late earlies' at any polling place in a voter's county at 7 p.m. the Friday before Election Day. Voters can currently drop off their mail-in ballots at any polling place through 7 p.m. on Election Day, but the processing and signature verification of those ballots hold up results reporting. More than 264,000 Arizonans — nearly 8% of voters who cast a ballot — dropped off their early ballots on Election Day in November, according to the Secretary of State's Office. Rep. Alexander Kolodin, R-Scottsdale, who chaired the House's Ad Hoc Committee on Election Integrity and Florida-style Voting, said during the Thursday press conference that legislators had put more effort into hearing from numerous stakeholders for this bill — including voting rights advocates and county recorders — than any other piece of legislation has gotten. While most of the state's 15 county recorders back the bill — unlike most Republican election reform proposals over the past several years — voting rights advocates were firmly opposed because the proposal would make it harder for Arizonans to vote. While a lot of attention during the four House committee hearings to discuss the bill over the past several weeks was given to eliminating ballot drop-offs at polling sites on Election Day, no one mentioned that voters would still be able to drop off their early ballots at other official ballot drop boxes through 7 p.m. on Election Day. The bill specifies that, after 7 p.m. on the Friday prior to an election, early ballots can only be returned to the county recorder's office, or to an in-person early voting location where voters would have to provide identification, possibly after standing in line. But the legislation does nothing to override a provision in Arizona's Election Procedures Manual that allows for those early ballots to be returned at drop boxes through 7 p.m. on Election Day. The Secretary of State's Office did not respond to multiple requests to confirm that drop box drop-offs would still be allowed on Election Day, but Senate Republican spokeswoman Kim Quintero told the Arizona Mirror that they would be. Arizona's Election Procedures Manual — which is written by the secretary of state and must be approved by the governor and attorney general — largely carries the force of law. While the current version allows Election Day ballot box drop-offs and almost certainly will maintain that provision in 2026, that could change in future elections if voters elect new statewide officials in 2026. The use of drop boxes would make last-minute voting easier for those in rural areas, especially those who live on the Navajo Nation, some of whom live more than 3 hours away from their county recorder's office in St. Johns. But it would still significantly shrink the number of locations where voters could drop off an early ballot on Election Day without ID from more than 600 to about 135, if counties keep the same number of drop boxes going forward as they did in 2024, according to the Clean Elections Commission. Even as Republican lawmakers scoffed at Democrats' claims that HB2703 would disenfranchise rural voters who would have to travel long distances to their county recorder's office to drop off their early ballot on Election Day, those Republicans never mentioned that drop boxes would be an easy and available option. Rep. Walt Blackman, R-Snowflake, told lawmakers in the House on Feb. 12 that it's easy to vote in rural Arizona because 'we have things called cars.' Kolodin on Thursday focused on the ways that he said the bill would expand voter access: by allowing in-person early voting — without requiring an emergency excuse — on the Saturday, Sunday and Monday prior to the election and by providing more in-person voting locations by requiring schools to serve as polling places. Ballot drop boxes have been a controversial topic for some far-right Arizonans and politicians who have claimed that they're not a secure way to vote and that they contribute to fraud, fueled by the debunked '2,000 Mules' film. Republicans in the House shot down an amendment proposed by Democratic Rep. Brian Garcia, of Tempe, that would have required rather than allowed in-person early voting the weekend before the election and sped up results by allowing early ballots to be transported for tabulation throughout Election Day. Garcia's amendment would have also continued to allow late-early ballot drop offs at all polling places on Election Day and given back the option for schools to opt out of serving as polling places due to space or safety concerns. The legislation would also require Arizonans to confirm their addresses every election cycle in Maricopa, Pima and Pinal counties — and every other election cycle in all of the other counties in order to receive an early ballot, even if they're on the Active Early Voter List. Currently, voters on the list automatically receive a ballot unless they don't vote early in two consecutive election cycles. In a Thursday press release, Hobbs, Senate Democratic Leader Priya Sundareshan and De Los Santos called the bill as a whole 'wildly irresponsible.' During the Thursday press conference, Maricopa County Supervisor Mark Stewart, who supported the bill, said that the county planned to put upwards of $1 million toward messaging ahead of the next election to make sure voters are informed about the changes in voting procedures. Maricopa County, where more than 60% of the state's registered voters live, has by far the most funding available for elections-related communications. 'Adding further restrictions to access the ballot box, gutting mail-in voting, or shifting additional unfunded mandates onto our county election officials are non-starters for Arizonans,' the Senate Democrats said in their statement. If Hobbs vetoes the bill, as she has promised, Republicans have a similar proposal, House Concurrent Resolution 2013, which would be sent to voters in 2026 if approved by both chambers. SUPPORT: YOU MAKE OUR WORK POSSIBLE
Yahoo
12-02-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
After court loss, GOP targets Grand Canyon monument through Trump
Senate President Warren Petersen on Jan. 13, 2025. Photo by Jerod MacDonald-Evoy | Arizona Mirror A top Arizona Republican is hoping the Trump administration will do what a federal court wouldn't: overturn a national monument protecting lands around the Grand Canyon so that mining companies can extract uranium and other valuable minerals from the land. Arizona Senate President Warren Petersen sent a letter to the U.S. Department of the Interior on Feb. 7 requesting a meeting with Secretary of the Interior Doug Burgum to discuss ending the 'government overreach' of the national monument and ban on uranium mining in the area. At issue is the Baaj Nwaavjo I'tah Kukveni – Ancestral Footprints of the Grand Canyon National Monument, which President Joe Biden created in 2023. Petersen and Ben Toma, who was at the time the speaker of the state House of Representatives, sued to have the designation revoked. SUBSCRIBE: GET THE MORNING HEADLINES DELIVERED TO YOUR INBOX The GOP's lawsuit argued that Biden did not have the power to create the monument, which spans 917,618 acres the federal government already managed. They also claimed it harms both the state and local communities by permanently barring uranium mining — limiting the state's potential future revenue — and complicating land development. On Jan. 27, Judge Stephen McNamee ruled that the Arizona Legislature and the other plaintiffs did not have standing to sue and dismissed the case. The Grand Canyon is the ancestral homeland of multiple tribal nations across the Southwest, and tribes still rely on the canyon for natural and cultural resources that are significant and sacred to their communities. The monument protects thousands of historical and scientific objects, sacred sites, vital water sources and the ancestral homelands of many Indigenous communities. The monument's name comes from the Indigenous names the Havasupai and Hopi gave to the area. In the Havasupai language, Baaj Nwaavjo means 'where Indigenous peoples roam,' while I'tah Kukveni means 'our ancestral footprints' in the Hopi language. The monument restricts new mining within the area, but any mining rights in place before the designation have not been impacted. Petersen called the Biden administration's designation of Baaj Nwaavjo I'tah Kukveni a 'land grab,' and said keeping it in place contributes to high energy costs and the United States' reliance on foreign powers. 'Ending the federal government's hold of this piece of land falls in line with the Trump Administration's goals of energy independence, job creation, and lower costs for Americans,' he said in a written statement. Petersen said that government scientists believe that there is more than 300 million pounds of uranium is buried near the Grand Canyon. 'The energy that could be produced from this mineral is astronomical,' he said. 'I look forward to working with Secretary Burgum on this matter of importance for Arizona and the entire nation,' he added. SUPPORT: YOU MAKE OUR WORK POSSIBLE
