Earlier this week I told you about a new law in Utah that would allow the state to give temporary legal status to undocumented immigrants. The passage of that bill by both houses of the Utah legislature has derailed the consideration of an Arizona SB 1070 clone bill in Nebraska.
The Nebraska legislature has decided to put off consideration of its own version of SB 1070 for a year to allow it to study the possibility of implementing a law like the Utah measure. Nebraska legislators were particularly swayed by the notion that one of the most conservative states had embraced the legalization program.
As Long Island Wins has repeatedly pointed out, part of the support for SB 1070 came from the federal failure to pass immigration reform. Americans want to know who the undocumented immigrants are, run background checks on them, and then allow them to live and work here if they are shown to pose no threat to the United States. The Utah legislation is a first step towards doing that.
