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11:35 AM Thursday, September 24, 2009

Despite signs that the weakened American economy has done more to discourage illegal immigration than all our politicians, two local officeholders are campaigning for a state bill that would beef up the immigration authority of county sheriffs. We still think it’s a bad idea.

This week state Sen. Gary Cates, R-West Chester Twp., and Butler County Sheriff Richard Jones appeared before the Senate State and Local Government and Veterans’ Affairs Committee on behalf of Senate Bill 150, which is sponsored by Cates.

A version of the same bill — which would give sheriffs more authority to enforce immigration laws — failed to get out of the Ohio House last year after winning passage in the Senate.

The bill would give sheriffs, like Jones, the power to take action in what are now civil immigration cases, if asked by the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement. Deputies can already arrest immigrants in criminal matters, but are not empowered to act in civil deportation cases. Cates’ bill would change that.

The bill would also allow county commissioners to direct sheriffs to hold people being detained for deportation or charged with civil violations of immigration law.

In other words, the bill broadens the authority of sheriffs, allowing them to become involved in matters that now fall solely under ICE’s jurisdiction. That’s despite last year’s statement by Ohio General Assembly leaders that most county sheriffs — according to the Buckeye State Sheriffs Association — “would not expend their limited resources (time, money and people) in rendering assistance to federal immigration officials in such matters on an ongoing basis.”

However, we know one sheriff who would expend his resources on such efforts, and that’s why Jones was in Columbus this week, urging support for the bill.

We agree with critics who say the expanded powers would distract county sheriff departments from their primary duty of enforcing criminal laws, increase mistrust and fear of police in our immigrant communities, and likely lead to racial profiling. Strident politicians have already created an unpleasant atmosphere of intolerance here, when we should be embracing our community’s diversity.

We don’t think Cates will find new support for his bill, mainly because the severe recession has reportedly curbed the influx of illegal immigrants coming from Mexico and other countries.

The Chicago Tribune reported this week that the nation’s foreign-born population declined slightly in 2008 after growing by almost 1 million a year for the last two decades. Statistics “imply very strongly that fewer people are coming and significantly more are going home,” Steve Camarota, director of research at the Center for Immigration Studies in Washington, D.C., told the Tribune.

Despite the trends, the bogeyman of illegal immigration has been revived in recent weeks as foes of health care reform look for ways to sabotage reform efforts and stoke fears that illegal immigrants will receive free health care — a notion that President Barack Obama has tried to dispel.

Illegal immigration has been a successful hot-button issue for certain politicians, and they’re reluctant to let it go. But state lawmakers should place Senate Bill 150 on the shelf and county sheriffs should leave immigration enforcement to ICE.

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