(C) Arizona Mirror This story was originally published by Arizona Mirror and is unaltered. . . . . . . . . . . GOP leaders: Border ballot referral isn’t unconstitutional [1] ['Gloria Rebecca Gomez', 'Ariana Figueroa', 'Ashley Murray', 'Dr. Matthew C. Whitaker', 'More From Author', '- July', '.Wp-Block-Co-Authors-Plus-Coauthors.Is-Layout-Flow', 'Class', 'Wp-Block-Co-Authors-Plus', 'Display Inline'] Date: 2024-07-02 Republican legislative leaders say a ballot referral headed for the November election that they claim would give Arizona the ability to enforce federal immigration law is constitutional, and a lawsuit aiming to prevent it from being considered by voters should be thrown out of court. “HCR2060 satisfies the single-subject rule because its provisions relate to one general subject – harms stemming from an unsecure border,” wrote attorney Kory Langhofer, who is representing the GOP lawmakers. House Concurrent Resolution 2060 is a compilation of Republican priorities that was sent to the November ballot after Gov. Katie Hobbs vetoed the most controversial proposal in it: a near-identical copy of a Texas law that would allow Arizona police officers and judges to arrest and deport migrants crossing the state’s southern border anywhere but at an official port of entry. Putting the matter to voters circumvents Hobbs’ veto pen. Just a day after the GOP majority greenlit the ballot measure, a Latino advocacy group launched a legal challenge against it in a bid to keep it off the ballot, arguing that it violates the Arizona Constitution’s requirement that ballot measures stick to one subject, making it unfit for voters to consider. Last week, Senate President Warren Petersen and House Speaker Ben Toma filed their defense of its constitutionality. The state’s lawyer, Arizona Attorney General Kris Mayes, filed a statement of no position in the case. While it was making its way through the legislature, Mayes voiced strong disapproval of the referral. Republicans: The border is the ‘single subject’ The Arizona Constitution mandates that ballot measures be governed by one subject, and not be made up of several disparate topics or goals. The requirement seeks to prevent logrolling, a practice in which multiple different policies are added to one proposal to recruit votes and ensure its passage when it would have failed on its own. Opponents of HCR2060 argued that it is a product of logrolling. The proposal, dubbed the “Secure the Border Act,” not only makes it a state crime to cross the southern border anywhere but at an official port of entry, it also penalizes undocumented Arizonans who submit false documentation to receive public benefits or apply for jobs. And it creates an entirely new class of felony offense, with harsh prison sentences, for people who knowingly sell fentanyl that later ends in someone else’s death. Petersen and Toma argued that each of the provisions aim to resolve problems originating from the state’s southern border, and therefore comply with Arizona’s single-subject requirement. “Plaintiffs’ claim fails because HCR 2060’s provisions ‘are reasonably related to one general subject’: responding to harms related to an unsecure border,” wrote their attorneys. Increasing the oversight of who is lawfully employed in Arizona and who uses public benefits is meant to reduce the “incentives” for illegal border crossings. And the criminalization of lethal fentanyl sales, which has been the provision most pointed to in the act as proof of its unconstitutionality, also addresses a crisis that stems from the “unsecured southern border.” In their filing, Petersen and Toma argued that fentanyl was included in the act because lawmakers found that transnational cartels fund their operations in part by trafficking and selling the drug. And, the duo added, the act also includes an affirmative defense for those accused under its provisions if the fentanyl or the chemicals it was made of were manufactured or legally imported into the U.S. That exception has been the source of much derision from Democratic lawmakers and legal opponents alike, who have pointed out that it’s impossible to determine where individual fentanyl pills are from, meaning the provision is unlikely to actually help anyone charged with the ballot measure’s enhanced fentanyl crime. The GOP leaders noted that the courts have long interpreted the single-subject law broadly, to give the legislature sufficient room to craft policy. As long as the provisions in a ballot measure are reasonably related to each other and fall under a general theme, the ballot measure as a whole is lawful enough to be put before voters in November, attorneys for the duo wrote. In fact, they added, the courts have only issued two official opinions in more than 100 years on single-subject rule violations, and the “Secure the Border Act” does not at all fall into the same category as those blatantly egregious cases. In 2021, the Arizona Supreme Court ruled that an attempt by the Republican majority legislature to ensconce mask mandates and critical race theory bans into the 2022 K-12 budget was unlawful. And in 1980, the Arizona Court of Appeals decided to strike down a similar move to place unrelated wishlist items like a mobile dental clinic and executive aircraft for the Department of Public Services in an appropriation bill for a new state prison. The court should use those two examples as a benchmark for what a single-subject rule violation does look like, wrote attorneys for Petersen and Toma. In light of those two cases, it’s clear that the “Secure the Border Act,” which is focused on addressing issues caused by the state’s southern border, shouldn’t be ruled unconstitutional. “The Legislature designed HCR2060 as a ‘holistic approach,’… to address the public safety crisis at this state’s southern border by raising the costs and reducing the incentives for such illegal activity that has undermined border security,” reads the brief. “The general purpose of HCR2060 is thus to reduce such illegal activity and thereby make the border more secure.” Opponents: a violation doesn’t have to be egregious In a response, a trio of immigrant rights advocacy groups reiterated that the court should invalidate the ballot referral and block it from being placed on the November ballot. Attorneys for Poder in Action, the Phoenix Legal Action Network and the Florence Immigrant and Refugee Rights Network, who have joined the legal battle against the ballot referral with Living United For Change, argued that a violation of the state’s single-subject rule doesn’t have to be as blatant as the worst examples pointed to by GOP leaders to warrant striking down the “Secure the Border Act.” “A Single Subject Rule violation can be either subtle or blatant, but a constitutional violation all the same,” wrote attorney Andy Gaona. The problem with the ballot referral is that it purports to address border security issues, but none of those issues are reasonably related. The prosecution of lethal fentanyl sales is wholly unrelated to the criminalization of undocumented immigrants who cross the border unlawfully or submit falsified documents. And, Gaona added, the court should pay more attention to how the act’s provisions operate in real life than with how Republican lawmakers say they should be interpreted. “The Legislature’s attempt to impose state law consequences against those who do not enter the country and State through a legal port of entry or who submit false documents or information in applying for employment or public benefits has nothing to do with imposing criminal liability on every adult who commits the ‘sale of lethal fentanyl,’” Gaona wrote. Gaona dismissed the arguments from Republicans that fentanyl was included because the border crisis exacerbates opioid overdoses in the state. Many products, both legal and illicit, cross Arizona’s southern border everyday, he argued, but that doesn’t mean that they’re related enough to include under the same theme. “The subject of an ‘unsecure southern border’ doesn’t give the Legislature license to cram the regulation of any conduct with any tie whatsoever to the ‘border’ into a single piece of legislation,” he wrote. Instead, Gaona said, GOP lawmakers have sought to use a tenuous association to tie several policies together — most of which failed to pass with majority support on their own, clearly marking the act an example of logrolling. The provisions in the act are sourced from five different bills, only one of which made it through both chambers of the legislature and was quickly vetoed by Hobbs. The fact that lawmakers at one time placed each policy in a separate bill, Gaona added, is an indicator that even they considered them to be unrelated. In both filings, GOP leaders and immigrant advocacy groups asked the court to award them attorneys fees if it decided in their favor. Oral arguments in the case are scheduled for July 8. [END] --- [1] Url: https://azmirror.com/2024/07/02/gop-leaders-border-ballot-referral-isnt-unconstitutional/ Published and (C) by Arizona Mirror Content appears here under this condition or license: Creative Commons CC BY-NC-ND 4.0. via Magical.Fish Gopher News Feeds: gopher://magical.fish/1/feeds/news/azmirror/