S.F. City Atty. To Fight “Draconian” Arizona Law

A neighboring state’s city attorney, well known for challenging the federal abortion ban, has graciously offered to spend his municipality’s public resources to battle Arizona’s new immigration law even though it doesn’t affect his constituents.

San Francisco may be nearly 1,000 miles from the Arizona capitol of Phoenix, but the official elected to represent its interests, City Attorney Dennis Herrera, will waste scarce local assets to meddle in the Grand Canyon State’s legislative process. The famously liberal California city by the bay has long protected illegal immigrants and local officials like Herrera are outraged that Arizona passed sweeping legislation prohibiting sanctuary policies statewide.

The new measure (SB1070) also makes it a state crime to be in the U.S. without proper documentation, allows local police to enforce immigration laws and punishes anyone—documented or undocumented—seeking work from a road or sidewalk. Drivers who pick up illegal alien day laborers will also be punished and all residents must provide evidence of their legal status in the U.S. under the new law, which takes effect in a few months.

Immigration advocates nationwide have denounced the measure as racist and some federal and state lawmakers claim it amounts to institutionalized discrimination and abuse that will lead to the arrest of seniors, kids and tourists. President Obama has ordered the Department of Justice to challenge the “misguided” law’s legality and vows to “closely monitor the situation” and examine the legislation’s civil rights implications.

Herrera quickly jumped on the racial profiling bandwagon, calling for a boycott of Arizona and Arizona-made products until the “draconian” and “unjust” law is repealed. He has ordered attorneys in his office to begin identifying and terminating contracts with Arizona companies and has pledged to assist in any legal challenges of the law

Even San Francisco’s mayor, who refers to Arizona’s measure as “un-American” and “unacceptable“ realizes this may not be the best way to spend taxpayer dollars. He warned that the city attorney will likely encounter many legal problems since boycotting a state and every company that does business in it is an “extraordinarily complicated matter.”