Similar to numerous other open border advocates the ACLU is strongly supported by the U.S. Commerce Department and transnational corporate interests.
DOBBS: We have reported extensively here on the position taken by the ACLU on illegal immigration, and its leading role in the lawsuit against Hazleton. Joining me now is Anthony Romero, the executive director of the ACLU. Anthony, welcome back.
ANTHONY ROMERO, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, ACLU: Thank you, Lou.
DOBBS: This trial, this ordinance is on trial. We say it’s the community of Hazleton, Pennsylvania.
ROMERO: That’s right.
DOBBS: The principal objection to a community trying to deal with the impact, illegal immigration, you put forward on a constitutional basis?
ROMERO: Correct.
DOBBS: What in this law, this ordinance, in your judgment in contravention of the U.S. constitution?
ROMERO: Well Lou, we all agree on the importance of immigration and trying to find a solution to it. The problem is that the Hazleton ordinance goes much further in dealing with that issue. It’s a state and a local ordinance dealing with a federal issue as we just heard from Jonathan Turley, that the law itself is written in such a way that it promotes discrimination.
It is not so surgical as only to focus on the issue of illegal immigration. The concern we have is that it’s going to promote racial profiling, it’s going to promote discrimination, it’s going to turn citizen or resident against resident and it’s going to have a much broader impact than even the mayor or individuals who are trying to fix a problem will want to have.
DOBBS: Are you as interested as the community of Hazleton and its residents in stopping the impact, the negative impact of illegal immigration on communities in the country?
ROMERO: I think that is an important issue that we need our Congress to solve and we need our government to solve.
DOBBS: OK, I’m asking you as the head of the ACLU, and I agree with you about Congress, but I’m asking you.
ROMERO: And one of the things I am most concerned about is ensuring the constitution and the Bill of Rights.
DOBBS: We all are. Partner, you’re never going to have an argument with me about the constitution or individual rights.
ROMERO: I know, that’s why I am here again.
DOBBS: But I want to understand, do you personally as the head of the ACLU take as great an interest in the concern for the community of Hazleton, and communities just like it all over the country.
ROMERO: Sure, sure.
DOBBS: That being the case. What could the ACLU do in combination, not with the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, which is supporting you, not in combination with other corporate interests, which is, sort of interesting for me, for the ACLU to be bound up there, what can you and Mayor Lou Barletta do if you sat down outside the courtroom, maybe crept over to his office or coffee shop and you say, you know, mayor, I am just as concerned as you are. Here is how we rewrite the ordinance? What would you say?
ROMERO: But Mayor Barletta has not been interested in such a dialogue. They changed law, four, five times.
DOBBS: But you’ve got a big organization, he’s got a small community. You’ve got more resources. Let’s you and I, let’s elevate it. Tell Lou Barletta what he can do with his ordinance to make it compatible with all our interests.
ROMERO: What’s also clear is that the mayor has been using this as a platform for a much broader debate.
DOBBS: He is an elected official. He is entitled to political impulses, you and I aren’t.
ROMERO: I agree, and that’s why we’re here to defend the rights of all people.
DOBBS: OK, good.
ROMERO: And the concern that we have is that the law is not surgically focused on the issue that he says he’s addressing. It is not focused.
DOBBS: But you’re personalizing the issue rather than dealing with what I ask — and what I ask Anthony is what could you and Lou Barletta work out on that ordinance to deal with what you say is a shared interest?
ROMERO: I think one thing.
DOBBS: Moving away the impact, the negative impact of illegal immigration.
ROMERO: I think the ordinance has to be struck down because it promotes discrimination.
DOBBS: OK, I understand that, you said that.
ROMERO: I don’t think the way he has framed it and the arguments he has used. You are someone who is concerned about empirical data. Scrub those numbers. You have the mayor in court today who couldn’t talk about the impact on violent crime, 228 violent crimes since 2001. Only two or three did the mayor could point to since 2001 to 2006 that were committed by illegal aliens.
DOBBS: How many cases did they have accurate data on how many people were actually illegal aliens?
ROMERO: He wasn’t able to answer the questions either.
DOBBS: No, but in this country is because the federal — if the state and local level people are not being permitted to answer the question.
ROMERO: Sir, the mayor is trying to — Lou, the mayor is trying to put together a solution to this issue. We have to scrub the data. The solution is not.
DOBBS: I’m an empiricist just like you. But I’m also a funny fellow. But I asked a question, which was how can you and Lou Barletta sit down?
ROMERO: After we win this lawsuit, we’ll sit down. Now we’re in court. We’ve got to win. We didn’t pick this battle.
DOBBS: What if you lose?
ROMERO: There’s no way — we’ll appeal it. There’s no way we can lose. The bill of rights is completely on our side.
DOBBS: OK, now, but you will sit down — you commit, sit down with the city.
ROMERO: After we win, we strike down this as unconstitutional. I’m more than delighted to sit down with the mayor and figure it out.
DOBBS: At the end of the trial. You are a good man, Anthony Romero.
ROMERO: I’m glad to be here.
DOBBS: ACLU, come back soon.
ROMERO: I will, sir.