Federal immigration-check requirement draws ire

[The Northerner]

Civil rights groups are considering a lawsuit to try to block the federal government from requiring all police agencies to screen people booked into local jails for immigration violations.

The Department of Homeland Security on Friday announced that local police agencies could not opt out of a program known as Secure Communities, which started in 2008, is now active in 1,300 local jurisdictions and is scheduled to be in place nationwide by 2013.

On Monday, civil rights groups said they were reviewing the decision to see why states such as Illinois and New York— where governors recently sent letters to Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) requesting to get out of the program — are now being told that they have no choice.

"ICE and the federal government don't get to rule by decree," said B. Loewe, a spokesman for the National Day Laborer Organizing Network. He said his group is considering a lawsuit to try to block the program.

For decades, police agencies have sent the fingerprints of people booked into their jails to the FBI to check for criminal records. Under Secure Communities, those fingerprints are also shared with the Department of Homeland Security to check for immigration violations.

Read more: http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2011-08-08-civil-rights-lawsuit-immigration-police_n.htm?csp=34news