The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals upheld an Arizona law that made it a crime to steal someone’s identity for the purpose of obtaining a job. The law had targeted illegal aliens committing identity theft but the court said it did not violate the Constitution because it applied to others as well.
In 2007, Arizona created a new offense of aggravated identity theft for people using another person’s information or false information. The next year, the state added to the offense of information use with an intent to gain employment. Illegal-alien advocacy groups sued arguing the law was preempted by federal law. In 2014, U.S. District Judge David Campbell agreed and issued an injunction blocking the law’s enforcement. Before Campbell’s injunction, the law had led to the arrest of more than 700 illegal aliens for ID theft in workplace settings.
In a unanimous decision, a three-judge panel of the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals said the Arizona laws also targeted workplace fraud unrelated to immigration and applied equally to citizens, legal immigrants and illegal aliens.
Judge Richard Tallman wrote, "Just because some applications of those laws implicate federal immigration priorities does not mean that the statute as a whole should be struck down…(T)hese laws could easily be applied to a sex offender who uses a false identity to get a job at a daycare center. Or the laws could be applied to stop a convicted felon from lying about his criminal history on a job application for a position of trust…Congress could not have intended to preempt the state from sanctioning crimes that protect citizens of the state under Arizona's traditional police powers without intruding on federal immigration policy. Thus, we hold that despite the state legislative history, Congress did not intend to preempt state criminal statutes like the identity theft laws."
The panel returned the case to District Judge Campbell to evaluate the plaintiffs' other claims, including whether the law is preempted when used to target illegal aliens.
Read more in The Washington Times.
