American Civil Liberties Union

The American Civil Liberties Union is challenging Utah’s “show me your papers” law modeled after Arizona’s notorious SB 1070. The lawsuit charges that the Utah law is unconstitutional in that it unlawfully interferes with federal power and authority over immigration matters in violation of the Supremacy Clause of the U.S. Constitution; authorizes and requires unreasonable seizures and arrests in violation of the Fourth Amendment; restricts the constitutional right to travel freely throughout the United States; violates the Equal Protection Clause of the U.S. Constitution by unlawfully discriminating against certain lawful immigrants as well as people in Utah without approved identify documents; and violates the Utah state constitutional guarantee of uniform operation of the laws.

The American Civil Liberties Union, the ACLU of Utah, the National Immigration Law Center and the law firm of Munger, Tolles & Olsen have filed a class action lawsuit charging that HB 497 authorizes police to demand "papers" demonstrating citizenship or immigration status during traffic stops, invites racial profiling of Latinos and others who appear "foreign" to an officer, and interferes with federal law.