What's the Matter With Oklahoma? State Launches Anti-Immigrant and Anti-Muslim Crusade

[marmar]

AlterNet / By Kari Lydersen

What's the Matter With Oklahoma? State Launches Anti-Immigrant and Anti-Muslim Crusade
While Oklahoma does not have a large immigrant population, the state has become an example of the illogical nature of anti-immigrant and anti-Islam laws.

June 24, 2011 |


Oklahoma has relatively few immigrants – about 5 percent of the population – but it has long been in the vanguard of anti-immigrant and more recently anti-Muslim legislation of the type sweeping the nation.

Last fall more than 70 percent of voters passed a constitutional amendment outlawing the use of Sharia law in Oklahoma courts, and state legislators have also pushed anti-Sharia laws, even though the Muslim legal code has never been introduced in an Oklahoma courtroom. On June 14 the Oklahoma state Supreme Court upheld most provisions of the state’s strict anti-immigrant law, passed in 2007 and seen as a precursor to Arizona’s infamous legislation. And this year Oklahoma City state senator Ralph Shortey introduced a suite of anti-immigrant laws including one billed as “Arizona Plus.”

Shortey is Native American and as a child lived on a South Dakota reservation. He said that’s one of the reasons he wants to send a message to undocumented immigrants that they are “not welcome” in Oklahoma. In March Shortey told a group of reporters with the Institute for Justice and Journalism that he knows what it feels like to have one’s land stolen, and he doesn’t want it to happen again through an influx of undocumented immigrants.

The bill he introduced would order police to enforce immigration law, allow law enforcement to confiscate the property of undocumented immigrants -- including homes and cars -- and could criminalize providing social services and otherwise interacting with undocumented immigrants. ............(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.alternet.org/teaparty/151375/what%27s_the_matter_with_oklahoma_state_launches_anti-immigrant_and_anti-muslim_crusade/

[ixion]

1. They should just rename the state Oklahomistan, implement theocratic rule

and get on with it, and I'll make sure I never drive through their crappy state again.

[CanonRay]

2. Have they outlawed dinosaurs as pets yet?

it must be in the works.

[OKNancy]

3. Oklahoma has some good and decent people in it, and I'd appreciate

people avoiding broad-brush attacks.
I would also like for people to know that, Shortey's bill failed.
The anti-Sharia law has been blocked, and will no-doubt be ruled unconstitutional.

If you read the article, you will actually learn that even entities such as the Tulsa Police dept.
are doing outreach to the Hispanic community to calm fears. You will learn of our efforts to stop
the religious right. They are behind this crap and they are well-funded.

[demosincebirth]

4. thats what we do here. Paint with a big brush. It's kind of standard, here