Illegal workers and employers could face a new hurdle. A proposed ballot measure would make it a crime to be an illegal immigrant in Arizona.

Employers who hire illegal workers would lose their business licenses.

This contractor said something needs to be done.

“We’ve allowed it to happen and we need to change it,” he said. “It is illegal and they shouldn’t be here.”

Don Goldwater, a 2006 candidate for governor, had this to say.

“If we get these initiatives passed it will take pressure off the hospitals. It’s going to take pressure off our educational system,” Goldwater said. “It will help reduce crime, and it will help reduce our neighborhoods to something we can call safe once again.”

One measure also aims to end so-called sanctuary policies, which prohibit police from asking the immigration status of those they contact.

In general, police have said enforcing immigration law will make it harder to maintain trust in immigrant communities. Fewer migrants would cooperate for fear of being deported.

Eric Edwards of the Police Chiefs Association says it’s also a resource issue.

“If we’re to address the most violent criminals, the ones who are preying on our communities, chiefs need the ability to determine the appropriate use of those resources,” Edwards said.

And Edwards said the constitution prohibits local police from enforcing most immigration laws, despite what initiative backers claim.

Immigrant rights advocates spoke out against the proposed measures.

“For all those who say we should punish the employer for hiring undocumented, I say you should be careful what you wish for,” said Lidia Guzman from “We Are America.”

She said the ballot proposals targeting employers could hurt all of us.

“Employers faced with stiff sanctions may just pick up their business and take it elsewhere and that’s going to hurt the economy of this state,” Guzman said.

She said the measure targeting companies who hire illegal immigrants doesn’t have strong support.

“The employers are not behind it and it affects the legislators who in the past have been very conservative,” Guzman said.

She believes the measure targeting illegal immigrants is unnecessary.

“It’s already on the books that to be here undocumented that you will be punished,” Guzman said. “They will ask for your deportation and they will deport you.”

She thinks immigration legislation should come from the top.

“The national level is where immigration should be addressed, not at the local level,” Guzman said.

The measure still needs thousands of signatures before it can make the 2008 ballot.

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