How to Defeat Sheriff Arpaio

Gabriel Lerner / HispanicLA

Last week, Cuentame streamed my video discussing Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio’s importance for Latinos in the US.

The interview was conducted on the eve of Saturday’s march in Phoenix against Arpaio and for Comprehensive Immigration Reform Now.

According to the organizers some 20,000 participants marched through Phoenix, ending at a county jail.  Although Arpaio‘s public position was that he didn’t care about the march, he ordered the jail’s PA ystem to play loud music as protestors passed.  (Local police estimated the marchers at 10,000.)

A contingent of activists from the Los Angeles area drove to Phoenix to participate. In several cities across the country there were smaller events to express solidarity, one of which took place at Plaza Olvera in Los Angeles, with about 100 participants.  

Arpaio – a sheriff with a PR department that would make a US Senator yellow with envy – reacted to the march with a truth and a lie.  All right, many lies.

The truth is that immigration policy is not set by him, but by Congress in Washington.

The lie is, “I am not the guy.”

Oh yes you are, Sheriff.

Arpaio promotes himself as “the toughest sheriff in the West.”  Since 1996, he has been Public Enemy #1 for undocumented immigrants, with the support of a clear majority of voters in his county, who reelected him in 2000, 2004, and 2008.

Last year, the Obama Administration rescinded Arpaio’s authority to make immigration arrests. He blatantly ignored the decision and intensified his raids against undocumented immigrants in Hispanic neighborhoods and factories where they worked, causing panic among the workers and suffering among the families. His activity was justified in the name of a couple of state laws, including one that makes the undocumented immigrants accomplices of their ‘coyotes’ because they pay them for their criminal actions.

For the last ten months the Department of Justice (DOJ) has been investigating whether Arpaio violated federal law in order to decide to indict him or not.  Ten months!

The more blatant Arpaio’s actions become, the more compelled the government is to create a perception of containment…and the more blatantly savage and practically criminal are Apaio’s reactions.

Even though he denies supporting groups like the Minuteman, Arpaio is the armed vanguard of nativists and xenophobes, who frequently wave signs saying "Way To Go Sheriff Joe” at their appearances.

What really enrages Arpaio’s critics is his evident impunity and blatant abuse of power.

Last November, a campaign launched by Presente.org and later expanded to other organizations led to the resignation of anchorman Lou Dobbs from CNN over his obsessive hostility against immigrants.

Is it possible to emulate the success of the Lou Dobbs campaign?

There are many differences between the two, starting with the fact that Dobbs was an employee of a private company. CNN’s profits depend on its ratings and image. The campaign against Dobbs was initiated just as CNN was about to present their “Latino in America” series aimed at making a favorable impression on Latinos, an important and growing segment of viewers.

Lou Dobbs was costing CNN too much. The network president Jon Klein made a clear, serious, and justified business decision: get rid of Dobbs.

Arpaio, on the other hand, is an elected official.

What is needed to stop him?

He could be recalled. To achieve that, County residents would need to collect enough signatures for a recall election. And some of them have tried, but without success. In February 2008, they recognized they couldn’t achieve enough signatures after a promising start in November 2007.  Besides, the polls gave Arpaio a sizable support of 65% of the electorate even if they had enough votes to place this on the ballot.