(Image source from: Fronteras Desk)
The federal judge announced on Thursday that incorrectly denied Arizona driver's licenses to non-citizens authorized to work in the United States by the federal government.
U.S. District Judge David Campbell ruled the state's policy denying licenses under certain Employment Authorization Document (EAD) codes impermissible and foreclosed by the Ninth Circuit's Dream Act decision which also found Arizona's denial of licenses for immigrants was usurped by federal law.
Plaintiff Marco Gonzalez, from September 2013 to February 2017, was the only non-citizen to get granted a driver's license in Arizona under a family unity Encoded Archival Description (EAD), after his legal team petitioned the Department of Transportation and less than a year later, Gonzalez's application for renewal was denied.
On the books, Arizona law merely asks for grounds that non-citizens are authorized by federal law to be in the U.S., and the EAD satisfies that demand. Alongside four other non-citizens, Gonzalez sued the Arizona Department of Transportation and DMV in September 2016.
Arizona's varying policies on different employment classes go back to an executive order issued by former Gov. Janice Brewer in 2012, requiring the state's 20,000 DACA recipients to present additional proof of legal status before obtaining a driver's license. Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, or DACA, was intended to grant temporary relief to undocumented immigrants who were brought to the United States as minors.
In 2016, the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals barred Arizona from distinguishing "between non-citizens based on its own definition of 'authorized presence,' one that neither mirrors nor borrows from the federal immigration classification scheme."
The family unity employment code issued to the plaintiffs named in this case protects "immediate family members of lawful permanent residents killed by terrorism or killed in combat and granted posthumous citizenship."
The plaintiffs besides wanted to include non-citizens granted employment under an "extended voluntary departure" code but yesterday's ruling was limited to the classification held by the lawsuit's named plaintiffs.
"Defendants, their officials, agents, employees, assigns, and all persons acting in concert or participating with them are permanently enjoined from implementing or enforcing a policy or practice of denying deferred action recipients with (c)(14)-coded EADs the ability to present their EADs alone to establish authorized presence for purposes of qualifying for Arizona driver's licenses," Campbell wrote, granting Gonzales a permanent injunction.
By Sowmya Sangam
