HB13, a pandering immigration enforcement bill, is a poorly written, poorly intended piece of legislation that attacks some of the country’s most basic rights.
Matt Simpson lives in an awesome world.
In that world where the state representative from Daphne resides, there is no such thing as law enforcement using the color of a person’s skin as cause to arrest or detain them. In that very special world, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officers are not using the color of someone’s skin, or the language that they speak, as probable cause to detain and arrest them.
We know this to be true of Simpson’s world because on Wednesday, during a public hearing for an illegal immigration bill before the Alabama House Judiciary Committee, Simpson sought to chastise a Tuscaloosa pastor who expressed concerns for the safety of his adopted daughter, who was born in Guatemala.
That man, Rev. Kevin Thomas, like most of the rest of us, does not live in Simpson’s world. In his world, he has seen footage of ICE agents all across the nation, and in Alabama, detaining, arresting, beating, pepper spraying, chasing and generally terrorizing thousands upon thousands of people based solely on the color of their skin and the language which they speak.
And Thomas told the committee of his fears, and his fears that the bill in question, HB13—a stupid, pandering bill, which even many law enforcement officials dislike, that encourages, and in some cases requires, various law enforcement agencies in the state to assist and participate in immigration actions led by ICE—would lead to his daughter’s torment.
It would do all of that, because like most pandering bills rushed through the writing process in order to capitalize on a national outrage or fear, it is poorly written, overly broad and leaves huge gaps through which bad actions often walk. One of the biggest in this bill is the fact that it fails to define probable cause for detaining individuals suspected of being in the country improperly. Which is what scares Thomas, because that lack of definition could be defined on the street by an overzealous cop to mean skin color.
Matt Simpson was aghast … at Thomas for even suggesting such.
“My issue is … when you talk about scaring people and you talk about the fear—when you get up here and you say it’s probable cause because of somebody’s color of skin, that initiates fear that there is absolutely zero legal basis for,” Simpson told Thomas, angrily. “That creates a fear of interaction with law enforcement when there’s no probable cause, because you say, ‘oh, the color of her skin is probable cause.’ That’s just not a correct statement of the law.
“When you get up and say these things, they have repercussions. And everybody that’s watching this … and you just stay unchecked for you to say that oh that’s probable cause because of the color of her skin, that’s just not right.”
That must be a truly special world indeed.
But here in this one, Trump’s Homeland Security Department went to court in order to use race and other superficial factors, such as accent and hair color, as a means to stop and detain people for immigration enforcement actions. The U.S. Supreme Court, which stopped factoring in the Constitution some time ago, ruled in September that such actions were temporarily allowable, as a larger case makes its way through the system. This seems like a good time to point out that Simpson is an attorney by trade.
But beyond that, you can open any social media platform or turn on any (actual) news channel and see such actions happening right before your eyes. It’s not like any of those guys wearing masks and semi-uniforms are exactly hiding it. In many cases, you can hear them on the audio literally telling the people they’ve detained that they’re doing so because they heard their accent.
As an attorney at the hearing mentioned later, there is a very well documented case in Alabama of a U.S. citizen who happens to be Hispanic being arrested TWICE simply because he had brown skin, spoke with an accent and was on a construction site.
It’s also worth noting that we all live in Alabama, where detaining and arresting people based on skin color could be in our state seal.
Oh, but don’t tell that to Representative Russell Bedsole, a major in the Shelby County Sheriff’s Department. After insulting an attorney who spoke against the bill for no other reason than he decided to be a jackass, Bedsole told everyone that he had never “heard or been a part of or been in the same room or encountered any directives, any policy, any unorganized agreement amongst officers to go out and target people based off the color of their skin, their nationality.” He said if this was a systemic issue in Alabama, he would have seen it somewhere.
So, Bedsole thinks because there wasn’t a racial profiling how-to meeting at the office it doesn’t exist. Swell.
Honestly, where is this world in which y’all live? This world where racial profiling doesn’t exist. This world where ICE isn’t using race. This world where police aren’t routinely targeting people based on their skin color.
Who do you think you’re fooling?
Certainly not Representative Chris England, who, seconds after Simpson’s scolding of Thomas, reminded everyone of what life is like here in the Alabama of the real world.
“I don’t want anyone to mistake that there is a very long, significant history not just in this country, but also in the state of Alabama, of people being racially profiled,” England said to Thomas. “I don’t want anyone to believe that your fear or your testimony is irrational or unreasonable. I don’t want to cast a wide net and say that law enforcement in general is just a bad thing. As you know, bad apples spoil the bunch.”
England said he has personally experienced being mistreated by law enforcement because of the color of his skin.
But then, England, like most of us, live in the real world.
A world that is being slowly destroyed by pandering politicians too concerned with sticking up for a party or pandering to the base to protect the most basic of rights and the most vulnerable among us.