Arizona vs. Obama, Round 1 | FrontPage Magazine

Arizona vs. Obama, Round 1 | FrontPage Magazine:

The Obama administration wasted little time condemning Arizona’s recently passed immigration law, even launching a lawsuit to prevent it from going into effect. Now the White House has been handed its first major victory by a federal judge who has struck down key provisions of the Arizona law, setting up a showdown between a state beleaguered by illegal immigration and a federal government determined to prevent it from doing anything to address the problem.

On Wednesday, Federal District Court Judge Susan Bolton blocked key portions of Arizona’s law dealing with the tide of illegal immigrants swamping Arizona, known as S.B. 1070, or more formally the “Support Our Law Enforcement and Safe Neighborhoods Act.” She preliminarily enjoined the State of Arizona and its Governor Jan Brewer from enforcing the most significant provisions of S.B. 1070. Judge Bolton did not give the administration everything it wanted, declining to block the entire law from going into effect as the Justice Department had requested. But what she left standing is of little significance compared to what she gutted.

While this is only the first battle dealing with a preliminary injunction – appeals of her order and a trial on the merits of the statute are yet to come – Judge Bolton has framed the constitutional issue of federal preemption in such a way that the Obama administration will have the upper hand going into the next rounds.

Judge Bolton left alone such provisions as prohibiting Arizona officials, agencies, and political subdivisions from limiting enforcement of federal immigration laws and such non-controversial provisions as making it a crime to stop a motor vehicle to pick up day laborers and for day laborers to get in a motor vehicle if it impedes the normal movement of traffic.