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SOUTHERN ARIZONA ENDODONTICS I
NSURANCE PROCESSOR

PHOENIX – Lawyers filed a second lawsuit challenging Arizona's new employer-sanctions law Sunday night, two days after a judge said the groups fighting the law sued the wrong government officials.

Attorneys for business groups named the state's 15 county attorneys in the latest lawsuit, something they failed to do the first time around.

In his ruling Friday night, U.S. District Judge Neil Wake said the first lawsuit was filed against the governor and state attorney general — who are given only investigatory authority under the law — and wasn't aimed at county prosecutors who actually have the power to enforce the restrictions.

Julie Pace, an attorney for the business groups, said Sunday the latest lawsuit contains the same arguments the first one did against the employer-sanctions law — that it's an unconstitutional attempt by the state to regulate immigration and that cracking down on hiring illegal immigrants is the sole responsibility of the federal government.

Pace said the latest lawsuit also includes evidence that business groups face imminent crackdowns. She said business groups believe county prosecutors already have illegal hiring complaints on file, and that requests will be made to the county attorneys to provide that information.

The judge had said in Friday's ruling that the business groups had no legal footing to make the challenge because they hadn't shown that they faced imminent crackdowns.

The plaintiffs are providing evidence including a declaration by an Arizona employer who states that he is knowingly hiring an undocumented worker and intends to do so after Jan. 1 and has been specifically threatened by the County Attorney that he is going to be prosecuted under the new law, Pace said Monday.

Promises by Maricopa County Attorney Andrew Thomas — the chief prosecutor in the state's most populous county — to enforce the law applied to all people in his county and didn't single out the groups challenging the law, Wake ruled.

Pace said the business groups are optimistic about getting the law — which takes effect Jan. 1 — put on hold.

"If we can get him to the merits of our case, we're going to win," Pace said, "because so many parts of the law are unconstitutional. It's a pretty clear-cut case."

The Republican-majority Legislature and Democratic Gov. Janet Napolitano approved the law this summer amid frustration over what backers of the restrictions said were weak federal efforts to confront illegal immigration.

The law was intended to lessen the economic incentive for immigrants to sneak across the border and curb Arizona's role as the busiest illegal gateway into the country. An estimated one in 10 workers in Arizona's economy are illegal immigrants.

Under the law, businesses that knowingly hire illegal immigrants could face a business license suspension lasting up to 10 days. Second-time violators would have their business licenses permanently revoked.

The law also requires businesses to use an otherwise voluntary federal database to verify the employment eligibility of new workers.

Critics of the law said it burdens employers and poisons Arizona's business climate.

Supporters said state punishments were needed because the federal government hasn't adequately enforced a federal law that already prohibits employers from knowingly hiring illegal immigrants.