On September 28, US District Judge Sharon Blackburn issued Orders denying three requests by the Obama Administration, a coalition of illegal alien and cheap labor interests led by the ACLU and SPLC, and several bishops, to block implementation of the Alabama Taxpayer and Citizen Protection Act of 2011 ("HB 56.")  Click on the attachments below to read the Order and Memorandum Opinion for the three related cases, plus the IRLI amicus brief:

 The three lawsuits are (1) U.S. v. Alabama et al. (Obama administration challenge); (2) Hispanic Immigrant Coalition of Alabama (HICA) et al. v. Bentley et al. (ACLU/SPLC/SEIU challenge); (3) Robert Parsley et al. v. Bentley et al. (Bishops challenge).

The court denied injunctions against the law as a whole, repeatedly emphasizing that only Congress-- and not the President-- can preempt state cooperative enforcement laws.  Judge Blackburn rejected challenges to six key provisions, including section 10 (state enforcement of federal alien registration crimes), section 12 (state and local police authorized to verify lawful status of local lawbreakers), section 18 (arrest and immigration status check for driving without a license), section 27 (most contracts with known illegal aliens unenforceable), section 28 (public school systems to collect data on impact of illegal alien student enrollment) and section 30 (state crime for illegal alien to conduct transaction involving any state or local license).

Several provisions were preliminarily blocked due to technical drafting flaws, while the day labor prohibitions and US worker anti-discrimination provision were found to be impermissible "sanctions" against employers that conflict with the federal employment verification statute.

IRLI filed a friend of the court brief on behalf of HB 56 sponsor State Representative Hammon and ten other state legislators.

The court also found that the bishops and many of the ACLU/SPLC plaintiffs had suffered no harm and thus lack standing to continue their lawsuits.