Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach backs harmful immigration measures in the state.

Even though several strict immigration bills stalled in the Kansas legislature last year, legislators are expected to consider harmful immigration measures again this year. And after more conservative GOPers replaced several moderate Republican senators in the 2012 election, Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach, the anti-immigrant official who wrote Arizona’s and Alabama’s extreme immigration laws, said he thinks state lawmakers will pass at least one of the anti-immigrant bills, according to the Wichita Eagle.

The Kansas legislature likely will consider four bills:

• One requires “state and local governments, and possibly private businesses, to vet employees through an electronic database;”
• another would mandate that “local law enforcement officers to check the immigration status of people they come in contact with,” if the they suspect the person is undocumented;
• another bill “would prohibit any public benefits from going to anyone here illegally;”
• the final bill tries to undo a 2004 Kansas law that allows undocumented immigrants to qualify for in-state tuition at state colleges.

Kobach said Kansas’ in-state tuition bill turned Kansas into “the sanctuary state of the Midwest” and that extreme immigration measures would force undocumented immigrants to self-deport, leaving jobs for unemployed Kansans. But Janeth Vazquez, communications coordinator for Wichita-based Sunflower Community Action, a pro-immigration reform group, said undocumented immigrants contribute more in taxes. And without immigrant workers, farmers in Western Kansas could suffer if they do not have enough workers — just like farmers in Alabama and Georgia after those states passed extreme self-deportation measures.

Even some Republicans are unsure of the harmful bills being floated ahead of the state legislative session that begins in two weeks. Michael O’Neal, the outgoing Republican speaker of the House and now president of the Kansas Chamber of Commerce, said the chamber opposes forcing employers to get rid of hard-working employees because of their immigration status. “It turns good people into ones who will commit fraud to get a job and keep a job,” he said.

Last year, Kansas Agriculture Secretary Dale Rodman sought a waiver from the federal government so that companies could hire undocumented workers, but Kobach dismissed any type of what he called state-level amnesty as illegal. “You might as well pass a law saying all Kansans should sprout wings and fly,” he said.

But while state officials and anti-immigrant conservatives may want to push for more extreme state laws, it’s clear that a comprehensive immigration reform plan that offers a path to citizenship would benefit all states by increasing the nation’s GDP and tax revenue. Congress needs to pass a law in order to address the issue nationally instead of continuing to have states pass their own immigration laws.

A federal judge on Tuesday struck down a key component of the New York Police Department’s aggressive stop-and-frisk program, under which police stopped more young black men in 2011 than the city’s total population of young black men.

In the first federal court decision to find that some elements of the program violate the Fourth Amendment, U.S. District Judge Shira A. Scheindlin held that police officers in the Bronx are routinely stopping individuals outside private residential buildings without reasonable suspicion that they are trespassing, and with great consequence:

For those of us who do not fear being stopped as we approach or leave our own homes or those of our friends and families, it is difficult to believe that residents of one of our boroughs live under such a threat.

The stops are part of the Trespass Affidavit Program, also known as “Clean Halls,” in which property managers in the Bronx can ask the police to patrol their buildings and arrest trespassers. Scheindlin found that officers have misconstrued the program as allowing stops for anyone outside these properties, without regard for whether there is evidence that they are actually trespassing. Scheindlin describes the story of one of the name plaintiffs in the case:

[A]fter finishing his work for the day as a security guard, Charles Bradley, a black fifty-one year old resident of the Bronx, took the subway to visit his fiancée, Lisa Michelle Rappa, as they had arranged the evening before.

When Bradley arrived at Rappa’s apartment building, a young man who lived on the first floor and knew of Bradley’s and Rappa’s relationship let Bradley into the building. Bradley then walked up the stairs to Rappa’s apartment on the fifth floor and knocked. Because Rappa is deaf in one ear, Bradley waited a minute or two. When there was still no response, he returned downstairs and left the building. Outside, he looked up toward Rappa’s window.

While Bradley was standing on the sidewalk, an unmarked green police van approached and an officer in the passenger seat … gestured for Bradley to come over. After Bradley approached the van, the officer got out and asked, “What are you doing here?”

Bradley explained he was there to see Rappa, and that he worked as a security guard. Bradley testified that the officer responded to his attempts to explain his presence by suggesting Bradley was acting “like a fucking animal,” searched Bradley’s pockets, then told Bradley to place his hands behind his back. Once Bradley was handcuffed, the officer placed him in the van, where there were two other officers. While the van drove away, the officers began to question Bradley: “When was the last time you saw a gun? When was the last time you got high? When was the last time you bought some drugs?”

After twenty or thirty minutes in the van, the officers stopped at the station house. Bradley was taken into a room, stripped, and told to wait. He was searched in “inappropriate areas.” For the next two hours, he waited in a cell with other people who had been arrested. He was then fingerprinted and given a desk appearance ticket and a date to appear in court to answer the criminal charge of trespassing. Later, Bradley’s defense attorney provided the Bronx DA’s office with a notarized letter from Rappa stating that Bradley had been visiting her. “[A]t that point in time,” Bradley testified, “paperwork was submitted to me stating that the People of New York declined to prosecute.”

This encounter in and of itself is a disturbing example of how these police stops play out – resulting not just in an unreasonable stop and interrogation, but in subsequent harassing treatment such as strip-searching, detention, and verbal intimidation that far exceeds the scope of any perceived threat.

But perhaps the most significant aspect of the 157-page opinion is Judge Scheindlin’s explanation of the even greater potential cost for people not fortunate enough to have a public defender like Bradley’s:

The stakes of “field interrogation” by the police have dramatically risen since Terry [v. Ohio, which established the legal standard for stop and frisks,] was decided in 1968. The use of incarceration has increased, sentences have grown, the threat of lengthy incarceration has created new incentives to plead guilty, and the collateral consequences of a conviction — on employment, housing, access to government programs, and even the right to vote or serve on a jury — have become more common and more severe. If an unjustified stop happens to lead to an unjustified arrest for trespassing, as it did in Charles Bradley’s case, not every overburdened public defender will have the wherewithal to obtain a notarized letter from the defendant’s host explaining that the defendant was invited, as Bronx Defender Cara Suvall did on behalf of Bradley. When considering the relative hardships faced by the parties, it is important to consider the potentially dire and long-lasting consequences that can follow from unconstitutional stops.

This ruling is only a preliminary injunction, meaning the judge found the plaintiffs are likely to succeed in their case, with an order that police cease performing trespass stops without reasonable suspicion, and a forthcoming hearing on other potential remedies. The lawsuit filed by a class of blacks and Latinos is one of three to challenge the city’s stop-and-frisk program. Since initial outrage over stark evidence that police racially profile in their stops and interrogations without any improvement in public safety outcomes, NYPD somewhat decreased the number of stop-and-frisks. But in the first nine months of 2012, the overwhelming majority —  87 percent — of the some 1,400 individuals stopped every day were black and Latino.

Last week, Reagan-appointed federal Judge Robert L. Miller dismissed the University of Notre Dame’s effort to undermine Obama Administration rules ensuring that working women will have access to birth control. The court did not reach the merits of the suit, instead dismissing it as, at best, premature:

HHS announced guidelines requiring health plans to cover contraception and abortion inducing drugs. for plan years after August 1, 2012. . . . Several months later, HHS finalized the regulation, but announced a year-long “safe harbor” from enforcement for nonprofit entities of a certain type, including the University of Notre Dame. HHS announced that it would amend the regulations before the end of the safe harbor to accommodate those entities by requiring their insurers to provide cost-free coverage for the contraceptive and abortion-related services. In furtherance of the anticipated amendment, HHS issued an Advanced Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (“ANPRM”). . . .

The present regulatory requirement isn’t sufficiently final for review to be ripe because the defendants have announced it will be modified and have underscored that announcement by providing Notre Dame with a safe harbor that protects it from the regulation as it exists today. Notre Dame lacks standing to attack the present regulatory requirement because it isn’t subject to that requirement, and, taking the defendants at their word, never will be subject to the present regulation. The defendants’ dismissal motion must granted.

For the record, Judge Miller’s claim that the regulations require coverage of “abortion inducing drugs” is completely and utterly false. The rules require coverage of “[a]ll Food and Drug Administration approved contraceptive methods, sterilization procedures, and patient education and counseling for all women with reproductive capacity.” Nothing covered by these rules — including emergency contraception — has anything to do with abortion. Indeed, increasing access to birth control will actually reduce abortions by preventing unwanted pregnancies.

Additionally, it is worth nothing that Miller’s opinion rests on a very narrow ground. Notre Dame’s case was tossed out both because it is exempted from current rules under the safe harbor for some non-profits and because the state of the rules that will apply when that safe harbor ends is in flux. Virtually every court to consider a case brought by a non-profit challenging the birth control rules has agreed with Miller that these lawsuits should not move forward for the time being, but the same cannot be said about lawsuits brought by for-profit businesses.

Under current law, these claims by for-profit businesses are especially weak. As the Supreme Court explained in United States v. Lee, “[w]hen followers of a particular sect enter into commercial activity as a matter of choice, the limits they accept on their own conduct as a matter of conscience and faith are not to be superimposed on the statutory schemes which are binding on others in that activity.” There is no guarantee, however, that the same justices who decided Citizens United will not also decide to wipe out decades of precedent governing religious employers seeking immunity to the law.

Infowars.com founder and conspiracy guru Alex Jones is enjoying a boatload of publicity after his unhinged appearance on CNN’s Piers Morgan Tonight on Monday evening. Jones compared President Obama to several dictators during the interview and called for a revolt. His moment in the news cycle appears to be winding down, though he now claims he is being followed by “crackhead cops”. But Jones has one prominent devotee who has faithfully promoted his screeds: Matt Drudge.

On Wednesday, the immensely popular Drudge Report helpfully echoed Jones’ comparison of Obama to Hitler and Stalin a couple days after the conspiracy theorist went on his televised rant about guns:

Morgan invited Jones on the show to discuss Jones’ petition to deport the British host for his gun control advocacy, but the interview quickly devolved into a bizarre, explosive diatribe about tyranny. Jones ranted:

Hitler took the guns! Stalin took the guns! Mao took the guns! Fidel Castro took the guns! Hugo Chavez took the guns! And I’m here to tell you that 1776 will commence again if you try to take our firearms!

While Alex Jones is generally dismissed as a conspiracy theorist who cannot be taken seriously, the Drudge Report is a favorite website of political pundits and conservative politicians. However, Drudge regularly posts links to Jones’ fringe theories, from the soundly debunked claim that Obama was not born in the US, to the less well known theory that the president once secretly worked for the CIA in Pakistan. A ThinkProgress study in July found 184 links to Alex Jones’ websites in just one year. Because of Drudge’s clout with the mainstream media, Jones has been able to take advantage of a much broader audience than he ever could manage on his own.

The Ku Klux Klan of Virginia is trying to find new members, and it is using President Obama’s second term as a recruitment tool.

According to local Richmond television station WTVR, residents in the area have received two KKK fliers in their driveways in the course of as many months. The fliers read, “WAKE UP WHITE AMERICA!!” and explain that “the majority of HATE CRIMES in America are committed by BLACKS against WHITES!!!”

In an interview with the station, the KKK bragged that their recruitment has been up thanks to Obama’s election, and expect it to triple during his next term:

“Since Obama’s first term our numbers have doubled and now that we’re headed to a second term it’s going to triple, this is going to be the biggest resurgence of the Klan since 1915,” said one of the Klansmen interviewed.

The Klansman have been handing out flyers in a Mechanicsville neighborhood, and neighbors who received them have contacted CBS 6.

“We’re not trying to target anybody or scare anybody with hate, we’re just using our freedom of speech to drop fliers,” said one of the Klansmen interviewed. “Everyone thinks that we’re a hate group, we’re not a hate group, we don’t hate anyone, and we want to see good things come to our race.”

Watch it:

Whether or not the KKK is fabricating its recruitment numbers, the technique underlines a scary trend in the United States. According to the Southern Poverty Law Center, antigovernment groups and hate groups are on the rise, and racial animosity toward the President has been a consistent issue during his time in office.

The racially driven hatred toward the President has also tracked with the rise of the Tea Party, whose leaders have made not-so-subtle dog whistle attacks against Obama.

As Colorado and Washington await clarity from the federal government about how it will react to new laws legalizing recreational marijuana, federal crackdowns of medical marijuana distributors are continuing to take their toll. While the nation’s largest medical marijuana dispensary survived the latest move to shut it down, the one-time owner of several dispensaries in Los Angeles received one of the harshest sentences yet – ten years in prison – after he declined to take a plea deal.

In sentencing Aaron Sandusky Monday for acts that are legal under California law, U.S. District Judge Percy Anderson said:

In this case, as the defendant was warned, the court’s hands are tied … Whether you agree with the defendant’s position or not.

Sandusky’s harsh sentence under the mandatory federal drug sentencing scheme is a stark reminder that, while users of medical marijuana have largely escaped federal prosecution and crackdowns, some distributors have not in many of the 18 states where they are legal. It is also representative of the inflexible and draconian mandatory minimum sentences imposed in drug cases. Individuals sentenced for drug crimes make up almost half of the ever-increasing federal prison population.

Judge Anderson also suggested in his ruling that Sandusky “built a veneer of legitimacy around his criminal enterprise using his customers’ good-faith search for pain relief,” though it is not clear that he was out of compliance with California law, which allows licensed medical marijuana dispensaries.

At trial, Sandusky’s lawyers were precluded from making the argument that Sandusky was complying with state law, and had relied upon statements by President Obama and Attorney General Eric Holder that they would not prioritize prosecution of individuals complying with state medical marijuana laws. Prosecutors also discouraged the jury from making a “moral” decision about the case by engaging by what is known as jury nullification. The jury instructions even included the sentence: “Congress has defined marijuana as a schedule I controlled substance, making it illegal under federal law. You must disregard any state or local law to the contrary.”

Just last week, a medical marijuana grower in Montana, Chris Williams, avoided a mandatory minimum sentence of 80 years in prison by agreeing to a last-minute deal to serve a minimum of five years. Most others who have been prosecuted under federal law for running dispensaries in states with medical marijuana laws have taken plea deals that allowed for shorter sentences.

Online petitions are circulating to grant presidential pardons to both Williams and Sandusky. President Obama did not grant any pardons in 2012.

Gov. Bob McDonnell (R-VA)

Like many other swing-states, Virginia’s elections in November were marred by long lines and short-staffed polling places. But if Gov. Bob McDonnell’s (R) proposed state budget cuts come to pass, election officials fear future elections in the Old Dominion will be even worse. In correspondence obtained by ThinkProgress under the Virginia Freedom of Information Act, state and local election officials talked of a “mass exodus” of key staff and questioned whether the state’s already cash-strapped election infrastructure can even survive another round of budget cuts.

Days after the election, McDonnell’s chief of staff directed agency heads to come up with plans to cut four percent from their budgets. A month later, he proposed more than $92 million in state budget cuts and reallocations.

After State Board of Elections Secretary Donald Palmer forwarded news accounts about this memo to city and county electoral boards, panicked local board members responded with their alarm.

Renee Bergmann Andrews, secretary of the City of Falls Church’s electoral board, wrote:

[So] we just had an election with 3-4 hour wait times because we didn’t have enough money (or authority) to add equipment, staff, etc., and now he wants us to cut more. Are we having fun yet?

Bill Dell, secretary of the City of Williamsburg’s electoral board, wrote:

I hope you will be able to ensure Governor McDonnell fully understands the impact of any further cuts in funding for Registrars and EB members across the Commonwealth. The community was barely able to survive the last round of cuts particularly in view of the fact that contrary to other Commonwealth employees our General Registrars have been cut out of any raises since 2007. It is unreasonable to assume we will be able to maintain the necessary employee quality simply out of loyalty to the community. There is no question in my mind we will be facing a mass exodus of our best people should we take further cuts to a compensation package that is already severely lacking. Our people are tired, frustrated and overworked. Don, there is no more blood in this turnip! The sanctity and overall success of our election process in the Commonwealth (which I’m sure you will agree is probably the finest in the nation) is dependent on keeping our best and brightest. Unfortunately the way things seem to be going the situation will only get worse in future elections. I hope we can avoid doing something really foolish.

Palmer, a McDonnell appointee, noted that “further reductions and the lack of investment in our general registrars (part and full time) is the biggest threat to elections in the Commonwealth,” and wrote:

There are severe pressures on the budget. Money really is the solution for fewer lines – ingenuity only goes so far. We can build it but without the resources on the state and local level, it will be difficult, too impossible. Wait till they see the bill for just keeping the status quo in replacing voting equipment statewide and [electronic poll books].

Palmer told ThinkProgress that Virginia “needs to dedicate additional resources to new voting systems to more fully meet the high demand of presidential elections, and maintain the professionalism of our local and state election officials. There are many different ways to vote to include absentee, in-person or by mail, and in person on election day. The best way to improve the administration of elections and to reduce lines is to invest in more efficient, accurate, and faster voting systems, and then to recruit and train poll workers to use the new technology. Without an investment into the fundamentals of election administration, you are working around the margins of the issue.”

While Congressional Republicans push for even more draconian cuts than are already on the books with the slightly-delayed sequestration, the consequences of under-funding vital government programs will be stark. Thousands of voters were effectively disenfranchised by the long lines at the polls in 2012 — but these cuts will likely make those problems far worse in future elections.