Gutted Arizona Immigration Law Goes Into Effect

Arizona's new immigration law goes into effect today, minus the key parts of it blocked by yesterday's federal ruling. Police won't be required to question suspects' immigration status and it's still not a crime to be found without immigration registration papers, but provisions making it a crime to pick up day laborers and banning "sanctuary cities" remain in place, the Arizona Daily Star reports.

Enough of the bill remains, in fact, that a Republican state senator calls the ruling a victory. Forcing cities to comply with federal immigration law and not establish "sanctuaries" for illegal immigrants was always the bill's first priority, Sen. Russell Pearce says. Pearce is "grasping at straws" by playing up the sanctuary cities provision when much of the rest of the bill was blocked, counters the director of an immigrant rights group.
(More Russell Pearce stories.)