Another special meeting took place today to hold both the second and third readings of the ordinance and pass it into law.

While no protest was planned at the September 12 city council meeting, Anna Arias, a leader of the Hazleton Area Latino Taskforce, told the Militant, “We are determined to keep fighting to overturn this mean-spirited attack on an important part of our community.”

Efforts to adopt and put into effect an anti-immigrant measure in Hazleton have been widely reported across the United States and copied in a number of smaller cities, where local officials have attempted to place blame for the social crisis in the country on the back of undocumented workers.

These moves have been met with both political and legal challenges. Hundreds have demonstrated in Hazleton demanding legalization for all immigrants. The Puerto Rican Legal Defense and Education Fund, the American Civil Liberties Union, and a number of local attorneys have filed a challenge to the anti-immigrant measure. Because of the lawsuit, implementation of the act was postponed by the city last week to allow for the revisions.

Barletta has received support from a number of national figures opposed to immigrants’ rights to revise the act and defend it in court. Michael Hethmon, from the Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR), rewrote the bill. Kris Kobach, an aide on immigration to former Attorney General John Ashcroft, has joined the city’s legal team, along with the Mountain States Legal Foundation. ProEnglish, another national right-wing group, has volunteered to defend the English-only bill from legal challenge.

The revised ordinance divides the measure into three separate bills. One establishes a city Code Enforcement Agency, charged with investigating any complaint charging that an area business or landlord has hired or is renting to undocumented workers. If the agency finds a violation, the business or landlord has a few days to file an answer or “correct” the situation—by firing or evicting the “alien,” or providing proof they are in the country legally—or face fines and loss of their business license.

The revised measure adds a section allowing workers who are laid off because an employer is closed down for hiring undocumented workers to sue to recover lost wages.

The second measure makes English the “official language” of Hazleton, mandating that all city documents be published in English only.

The third ordinance adds additional penalties against landlords who rent to people who do not have an official city “occupancy permit.”

“How much of [the city’s problems] could be blamed on illegal immigration,” said an editorial supporting the anti-immigrant measures in the September 8 Hazleton Standard-Speaker. “To be honest, Mayor Barletta never provided a good answer to that question.”

“It’s also unclear how or even if the city will ever enforce the ordinance,” the editors added. “Interestingly, it may never have to.”

“While no one has dependable numbers, it’s clear that many people have left town and it’s a fair assumption that many of the departed weren’t contributing anything to the community,” they say.

Speaking before the special council meeting, Allentown attorney David Vaida, one of the lawyers involved in challenging the measures, said that it would “create a climate of fear,” pitting “neighbor against neighbor.”

“Ultimately they will end up in the Supreme Court,” Vaida added. “In our opinion this will not stand.”

“The fight to defeat the anti-immigrant ordinance in Hazleton is part of the broader struggle for unity for the working class,” Osborne Hart, Socialist Workers Party candidate for governor of Pennsylvania, said as he campaigned in Philadelphia’s Black community September 9. “Labor must fight for the legalization of all immigrants and throw the power and resources of the union movement into this battle. We urge working people and others to join those in the Hazelton area fighting to defeat the anti-working-class ordinance the Hazleton city council passed.”
 
 
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Republicans take ‘guest worker’ bill off table and push for tighter border
Amnesty! Stop the deportations!
Socialist candidate for governor of Florida: ‘Immediate, unconditional legalization for all!’  
 
 
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