Arizona's Next Target: 'Student' Amnesty' [View All]

http://motherjones.com/mojo/2010/05/arizona-students-illegal-immigrants

Arizona's Next Target: 'Student' Amnesty?
— By Suzy Khimm
| Fri May. 14, 2010 1:12 PM PDT


Arizona’s anti-immigration crackdown is only getting started—and students are increasingly in the state’s sights. Having passed one of the nation’s harshest laws against illegal immigration and a separate law targeting ethnic studies, state legislators could soon take up a new bill that would zero in on illegal immigrant children within the public schools. The Daily Beast’s Dana Goldstein reports:

A new bill would require them to record and report to the state the number of illegal immigrant children in their student population, along with an estimation of the costs associated with educating those children.

If passed, SB 1097 would compel teachers and administrators to determine the legal status of students and their families, almost certainly discouraging enrollment and parental participation at school.

The students bill was passed by the Arizona state Senate on March 31 and is now pending before the House. Sponsoring the legislation is none other than GOP state senator Russell Pearce, the primary sponsor of the recent immigration bill. As Goldstein notes, Pearce had previously tried to push for legislation that aimed to deny citizenship status to children born to illegal immigrant parents. He also wrote a ballot 2006 initiative that "denied students the right to in-state college tuition or scholarships if they had been brought to the country illegally as children."


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