US judge pauses enforcement of Oklahoma immigration law

By Dietrich Knauth

NEW YORK (Reuters) -A federal judge on Tuesday temporarily blocked enforcement of an Oklahoma law that imposes criminal penalties on non-citizens who enter Oklahoma illegally, saying the law likely intrudes on the federal government's authority over immigration.

U.S. District Judge Bernard Jones ruled the law, HB 4156, may not be enforced for at least 14 days while a court challenge proceeds. Jones said he will consider a longer-term injunction of the law after a court hearing in early June.

The American Civil Liberties Union, which represents Oklahoma-based organization Padres Unidos de Tulsa and several individual plaintiffs in the lawsuit, said the ruling was a "victory for Oklahoma’s immigrant community" and a step towards permanently blocking the law.

Oklahoma’s attorney general Gentner Drummond criticized the decision as "outrageous," saying it would imperil Oklahoma’s efforts to stop drug trafficking and other criminal activity in the state.

The law empowers state and local law enforcement officers to arrest immigrants suspected of being in the U.S. illegally. A first offense under the law is a misdemeanor, punishable by up to a year in jail and a fine of $500, and a second offense is a felony that could result in up to two years in prison. The law also requires a person to leave the state within 72 hours of conviction or release from custody.

The Department of Justice, under ex-President Joe Biden, had sued Oklahoma over the law, saying it was an unconstitutional violation of the federal government's immigration authority. But after Republican President Donald Trump was elected, the DOJ dropped its lawsuit.

Jones said the change in administration did not impact his finding that Congress intended “to make immigration regulation exclusively federal,” rather than subject to state-level criminal penalties.

(Reporting by Dietrich Knauth; Editing by Leigh Jones and Lincoln Feast.)

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