We enthusiastically applaud the fact that the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division has opened an investigation into Maricopa County, Arizona Sheriff Joe Arpaio for alleged discriminatory police practices and allegedly unconstitutional searches and seizures. It’s about time.
As several members of the House Judiciary Committee wrote last month in a letter to the Justice Department, the use of racial profiling and the segregation of people by race, as well as publicity stunts are no substitute for sensible, fair enforcement of the law. For quite a while now, Arpaio has demonstrated that he is less interested in the constitution and the laws than in getting publicity for sensationalistic statements and actions.
Last month, Arpaio paraded undocumented immigrants shackled together to the "tent city" he created for such purposes in the Arizona desert. Mocking the detainees, he referred to the electric fences surrounding them, saying that "this is a fence they won’t want to scale." Now we learn that in order to denigrate detainees, he makes them wear pink underwear, a sample of which he gave, autographed, to a Hispanic television journalist who went to interview him.
We also agree with the activists who are calling to suspend the 287(g) agreement that allows the Maricopa County Police Department to engage in immigration enforcement activities. In the last two weeks, an independent study and a Government Accountability Office audit found serious problems in the application of this program, which has been sold as a powerful crime-fighting weapon, but has actually been used to arrest undocumented workers.
We hope the investigation is taken to its logical conclusion.
